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The Lunacy of Artemis

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Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#271

Post by sidewndr46 »

PaulHoule wrote: post #265

It's easy to miss how clever the Apollo mission architecture was. The moon is not so far away in terms of distance but it is very far away in terms of Δv because, not least, you have to land propulsively because there is no atmosphere to slow you down. Trips to some near-Earth asteroids are easier than the lunar surface, Mars and Venus aren't that much harder because in any of those cases the Moon's gravity can be he…

When you say "Moon's gravity can be helpful." do you mean some sort of slingshot around the moon to get to a trajectory that is closer to a Mars orbital insertion?

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#272

Post by usrbinbash »

thisaccount546 wrote: post #261
davedx wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you think is useful for NASA to do? Do you think any form of spaceflight is useful ?

The weird thing about NASA's budget when you look at it[1] is that funding allocation appears to be inversely proportional to the benefit. Human spaceflight is the largest chunk, at 44.9% of the budget. Aeronautics and technology are at the bottom, with technology being allocated 4.9% of the budget, and aeronautics 3.5%. There were good reasons why people were interested in sending people into space in the early days…

> There were good reasons why people were interested in sending people into space in the early days of space exploration. Before automated systems were sufficiently developed, manned programs looked like the best choice. But once automated systems became sufficiently advanced, it was clear that they were the way to go.

This, and it never ceases to baffle me that there are people who still believe that there is some sort of actual, honest, technical reason to put people into things that go into space.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#273

Post by jwells89 »

usrbinbash wrote: post #263
throwawayffffas wrote: post #213

> Conversely, if SpaceX and Blue Origin can’t make cryogenic refueling work, then NASA has no plan B for landing on the moon. If SpaceX and Blue Origin can't. Then Nasa will find someone who can. Cryogenic refueling is the projects real engineering target. Landing on the moon in the twenty twenties just isn't that impressive anymore. The Artemis program is nominally about going to the moon, but it really isn't. It's…

> It's about building and living in habitats beyond low orbit And what for if I may ask? And please don't say "technological development" or "colonizing space". ad Development): Most of the tech that needs to be developed for this, is what is commonly called space plumbing: Figuring out ways to make human bodily functions not immediately fail in space. Next to none of these technologies benefit humanity at large in a…

Long-term habitation of surfaces of bodies other than that of Earth is a stepping stone to being able to live in space long term in very large, permanently spaceborne crafts. It’s easier to develop these things on the moon, mars, etc because of immediate access to materials that’d need to be launched into orbit otherwise. In the long term, it may make sense to build shipyards on the moon, on Mars, or somewhere in the asteroid belt where large ships can be built and launched without having to fight Earth’s strong gravity well.

As for why to do that, I like to think of Earth as a very cozy cave that humanity’s caveman would serve itself well to venture beyond, if only to increase the number of possibilities for the species. In a universe where there are large human civilizations not just throughout the solar system but also scattered amongst other star systems, there are numerous paths that each branch will take that Earth’s branch in its lonesome may never have trodden.

It also just seems a bit cruel to be able to see the vastness of the universe and never be able to touch any of it in person. At the risk of being dramatic, only sending rovers and probes while we remain on earth feels a bit like being stuck in a gilded cage piloting around drones and RC cars to explore what lies beyond.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#274

Post by sidewndr46 »

mglz wrote: post #203
kqr wrote: post #180

I didn't live through the early space programmes, but having read about them recently, I'm surprised by how incremental they (and the Soviet Sputnik and Vostok counterparts) were. - The early Mercury flights developed the idea of putting a human in a capsule on top of an ICBM to see what happens at altitude and during re-entry. - Later Mercury flights experimented with de-orbiting techniques. (The early flights didn'…

The space race likely necessitated NASA to show some improvement frequently. Otherwise the Soviet Union would have filled the large gaps between infrequent launches with their incremental successes.

The other thing you have to remember is that back in that era, the various military agencies all had a vested interest in rocket technology. Either for suborbital attack profiles or for orbital reasons like recon satellites (which at one point were assumed to be manned, but that didn't prove required).

NASA wound up giving Congress a way to partially unify some of this. Saturn V obviously isn't an ICBM, but if we have the people and technology to make a man-rated rocket to get to the moon it's pretty safe to assume we can build ICBMs to any specification. The military wasn't thrilled with this early on because it meant rockets that were seen as weapons needed to be designed with huge safety margins.

In the end a sort of uneasy truce arose from this and lead to the Space Shuttle. This was intended to create a civilian program with indefinite access to low earth orbit, servicing military and intelligence needs when required. Once it became apparent this was impossible, Congress gave the DoD the go ahead to resume spending on their own ride to space. This in turn lead to the absolute debacle that was the Titan IV. This lead to the EELV program which gave us Atlas V. By this point the US's capabilities had declined so much the best we could do was strap a US made fuel tank to a bunch of Russian made rockets.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#275

Post by adolph »

scotty79 wrote: post #264
leoedin wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Iterative development is the only way you can do R&D. That truth was clearly known by NASA leadership in the 60s in a way that clearly isn’t today. I think it’s probably a symptom of wider culture. In the 60s every major industry was in the middle of a massive improvement cycle, a lot of the engineers would have learned their skills during the R&D boom of the Second World War, and everything was still manufactured lo…

> That truth was clearly known by NASA leadership in the 60s in a way that clearly isn’t today. Maybe the current generation grew up on way too many vivid SF movies. And their intuitions are that we should know it enough already to wing it on the large parts.

waterfall project, cost-plus contracting and congressional appropriations "report language"

On Self-Licking Ice Cream Cones, a paper by Pete Worden about NASA's bureaucracy, to describe the relationship between the Space Shuttle and Space Station. [0, linked from 1]

0. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/234554226_On_Self-L...

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-licking_ice_cream_cone

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#276

Post by PaulHoule »

rockemsockem wrote: post #227
imiric wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'd say the climate is as tense today, and it is getting tenser. I think that all the examples you mentioned pale in comparison to the terror of global annihilation from nuclear weapons, a couple of decades after the bloodiest war in human history, during the peak of the Cold War. Conflicts exist today as well, and there is an increasing risk of a global conflict, but there is no urgency of beating an adversary ide…

I certainly agree with the lack of political support, but the American public never supported Apollo. There was a brief moment, right when Apollo 11 landed on the moon, when just over 50% of Americans thought Apollo was a good idea. The rest of the time it was a majority opinion that it wasn't worth it.

This Feb 1968 poll

https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/ipoll/study/31107646/questio...

asked of 58% of people who favored cuts in domestic spending, found 5% of people wanted cuts to "Space technology, Moon Shots, Scientific Research" (compared to 20% in welfare)

However, this one

https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/ipoll/study/31107534/questio...

says 54% of people think the space program is "not worth it" in July 1967 and similar questions around that time get similar results. In April 1970 (after the 1969 success) Harris asks the question

https://ropercenter.cornell.edu/ipoll/study/31107574/questio...

and gets 64% "not worth it".

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#277

Post by ikeashark »

seastarer wrote: post #231
philipwhiuk wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They were required, by Congress, to use Shuttle engines and SRBs to build a vehicle capable of deep space transportation.

They should have refused

Congress: Use Shuttle engines and SRBs to build a vehicle capable of deep space transportation.

Nasa: No that's too costly.

Congress: lol ok we'll slash funding + you legally can't refuse.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#278

Post by z0r »

jwells89 wrote: post #273
usrbinbash wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's about building and living in habitats beyond low orbit And what for if I may ask? And please don't say "technological development" or "colonizing space". ad Development): Most of the tech that needs to be developed for this, is what is commonly called space plumbing: Figuring out ways to make human bodily functions not immediately fail in space. Next to none of these technologies benefit humanity at large in a…

Long-term habitation of surfaces of bodies other than that of Earth is a stepping stone to being able to live in space long term in very large, permanently spaceborne crafts. It’s easier to develop these things on the moon, mars, etc because of immediate access to materials that’d need to be launched into orbit otherwise. In the long term, it may make sense to build shipyards on the moon, on Mars, or somewhere in the…

Imagine being born in a habitat on another planet that is further away from Earth in travel time than one's lifespan, and being robbed of your birthright to experience the natural wonders and beauty of the cradle of humanity.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#279

Post by usrbinbash »

jwells89 wrote: post #273
usrbinbash wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's about building and living in habitats beyond low orbit And what for if I may ask? And please don't say "technological development" or "colonizing space". ad Development): Most of the tech that needs to be developed for this, is what is commonly called space plumbing: Figuring out ways to make human bodily functions not immediately fail in space. Next to none of these technologies benefit humanity at large in a…

Long-term habitation of surfaces of bodies other than that of Earth is a stepping stone to being able to live in space long term in very large, permanently spaceborne crafts. It’s easier to develop these things on the moon, mars, etc because of immediate access to materials that’d need to be launched into orbit otherwise. In the long term, it may make sense to build shipyards on the moon, on Mars, or somewhere in the…

> a stepping stone to being able to live in space long term in very large, permanently spaceborne crafts.

That is not going to happen, without technology that currently only exists in Science Fiction, like artificial gravity, for the simple reason that we require 1g to live, let alone thrive.

> because of immediate access to materials that’d need to be launched into orbit otherwise.

1. How does this "immediate access" benefit the aforementioned "very large, permanently spaceborne crafts", which apparently won't be moored to planetary bodies?

2. There is no "immediate access". Having rocks next to me, and having the sort of highly refined materials that go into building the tech required for spacecraft, are 2 VERY different things. But, I am always happy to be proven wrong: Let's take a very simple task, like ISRU'ing LOX & Methane, and let's do it, at scale, here on Earth, where there is no lack of energy, breathable atmosphere, building materials and labour. Strange, isn't it, that no one seems to be doing that.

> In a universe where there are large human civilizations not just throughout the solar system but also scattered amongst other star systems, there are numerous paths and discoveries that each branch will take that Earth’s branch in its lonesome may never have trodden.

I agree. But given that, what evidence supports the idea that the branch that eventually allows us to leave our solar system requires us to first waste tons of resources on trying to send people to inhospitable, irradiated rocks for no good reason?

Especially since we have a perfectly good alternative to this waste of time: Sending robots.

> It also just seems a bit cruel to be able to see the vastness of the universe and never be able to touch any of it, in person.

Unless we discover a way to do FTL travel, it doesn't matter if that feels cruel or not, it is reality.

And I can pretty much guarantee that the person discovering the means to cheat physics in such a way won't be doing so while constantly worrying about his habitats airlock malfunctioning, or the piss-regeneration system giving out, or the supply ship getting canceled in the next congressional-bickering about the budget.

It will happen here on Earth, likely by someone who never visited even LEO, someone who works and lives in a stable environment with books, people to talk to, air to breathe and delicious non-freeze dried food to eat, who never has to worry whether there will be enough recycled piss to make his next cup of coffee.

Re: The Lunacy of Artemis

#280

Post by adolph »

usrbinbash wrote: post #270
Yossarrian22 wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s also the unstated purpose of beating China to setting up a base.

And what if China gets there first? How exactly would that benefit them, in a geopolitical sense? Sorry, but if I have the choice of wasting that much resources just so I can brag about it a bit sooner than my opponent, or watch my opponent do so, while I use said resources more productively, I know what to do.

If China gets there first, they will accomplish half of the above stated number two reason, reproduced below.

> The second reason we are going to the moon so that we can put the first person of color and the first woman on the moon. That is explicitly an Artemis mission purpose.

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