Does space matter to you?

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20 May 2011, 5:28 pm

Does the development of a self-sustaining space industry matter to you (and by this I mean, do you consider it important whether personally affected or not)?

For me, I consider the development of a self-sustaining space industry to be highly important. Whether or not we run out of fuels or resources any time soon, thanks to environmentalists we're going to act like it anyway. Having an economy in space, with torus type agricultural stations, colonies in space, colonies on the moon, colonies on Mars and the moons of the gas giants, people would eventually have more places to go in addition to other cities or countries on Earth. If the space industry is not developed though, we're going to be stuck with the environmentalists and their demands for population reduction (as per the textbook Sustaining The Earth in its first chapter) and other such junk reminiscent of Thomas Malthus. Space is cool in and of itself, and to use that vast volume and the resources within it is something that I think we ought to do.

ruveyn
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20 May 2011, 5:41 pm

iamnotaparakeet wrote:

If space projects are profitable, there will be development.

As long as the Government is involved they will mostly go nowhere.

ruveyn

Vigilans
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20 May 2011, 5:44 pm

ruveyn wrote:

If space projects are profitable, there will be development.

As long as the Government is involved they will mostly go nowhere.

http://www.space.com/8541-6-private-companies-launch-humans-space.html

We're finally entering the time period where private companies have the tech and willingness to try their own hand at space exploration and exploitation

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Last edited by Vigilans on 20 May 2011, 5:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.

iamnotaparakeet
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20 May 2011, 5:45 pm

ruveyn wrote:

iamnotaparakeet wrote:

If space projects are profitable, there will be development.

As long as the Government is involved they will mostly go nowhere.

ruveyn

Well, for now it would appear that NASA's going to be taking a far lesser role as supplying the ISS is going to be primarily by Russia and SpaceX, but hopefully the Stone Aerospace company that Vigilans mentioned in another thread may start the space industry rolling in a profitable manner rather than forever being kept on ground based life support.

simon_says
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20 May 2011, 5:56 pm

This is a great time for the development of a space industry. There are several private companies about to come online to supply the space station, a number private capsules for astronauts in development, and a private space station under development.

If these things work out we'll have a commercial space program working alongside NASA for the first time in history.

ruveyn
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20 May 2011, 5:57 pm

simon_says wrote:

NASA is now an impediment to progress. It is a bloated and corrupt organization. Its management is an abomination.

ruveyn

Sand
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20 May 2011, 6:00 pm

The incredibly amusing and totally impractical concept that space is a reasonable solution for the population problem is one of the fantasies of someone lost in one of the idiotic dreamlands of science fiction. The price of putting even one individual in space is overwhelming and over the half century of the development of space technology the costs have remained monstrously high. At best a millionaire or two may enjoy a few minutes of being tossed into the edge of space and safely dropped down into the safety of our planet.
Space is a killer and all sorts of very basic physiological problems become apparent when an Earth born creature leaves the planet on which it has evolved. Perhaps in the next few centuries, if civilization lasts that long, ( The current prognosis is not favorable) biological engineering can develop a specialized form of human that can endure the difficulties of life away from Earth but this creature will certainly not be what we now call human and certainly will not be the solution to the enthusiasm people demonstrate to reproduce.

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20 May 2011, 6:00 pm

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NASA is now an impediment to progress. It is a bloated and corrupt organization. Its management is an abomination.

Their human flight program maybe. But their unmanned programs are unmatched. They do it better than anyone.

And their saving grace right now is the seeding of commercial companies to accelerate development. Even if their next big rocket never flies, there will be several potential routes forward now.

ruveyn
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20 May 2011, 6:04 pm

simon_says wrote:

Their human flight program maybe. But their unmanned programs are unmatched. They do it better than anyone.

The only people who have the money to serious scientific unmanned projects are the government run and funded space programs. About a half dozen in the world. The Government is providing the boosters and private companies are making the packages for commercial projects. Governments get the money for these projects by stealing it from citizens. It is called taxation.

I am waiting to see if any private companies can make heavy duty boosters. That will break the government monopoly.

iamnotaparakeet
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20 May 2011, 6:11 pm

Sand wrote:

The price of putting on person into orbit is offset by the price of thousands of bureaucrats and workers on the ground. The space industry has been set back by politicians and bureaucrats for most of the half of a century you refer to. Space itself is a vacuum, but nobody is talking about putting people directly into the environment of space. Shielding for radiation and rotation for artificial gravity are possible even with the technologies we have now. Right now, there's a science camp in space, making less money than put into it. Businesses don't care for that since they are for profit and not for charity, so it's not going to be just a forever wait so long as politicians and bureaucrats don't kill our last chance at entering space. You probably scoffed at the notion of landing humans on the moon, didn't you, since until it happened it was also "only science fiction".

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20 May 2011, 6:18 pm

ruveyn wrote:

simon_says wrote:

NASA is now an impediment to progress. It is a bloated and corrupt organization. Its management is an abomination.

ruveyn

What government agency isn't?

ruveyn
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20 May 2011, 6:19 pm

Raptor wrote:

ruveyn wrote:

simon_says wrote:

NASA is now an impediment to progress. It is a bloated and corrupt organization. Its management is an abomination.

ruveyn

What government agency isn't?

good question. Most government agencies are a blight on humanity.

ruveyn

Sand
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20 May 2011, 6:29 pm

ruveyn wrote:

Raptor wrote:

ruveyn wrote:

simon_says wrote:

NASA is now an impediment to progress. It is a bloated and corrupt organization. Its management is an abomination.

ruveyn

What government agency isn't?

good question. Most government agencies are a blight on humanity.

ruveyn

Without the government initiating basic work in electronics, communication, nuclear energy and particle physics, astronautics, and several other basic areas rocketry would be still concerned with the celebrations of the Fourth of July and New Years.

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20 May 2011, 8:38 pm

Without a miracle as seen in some sci fi of cheap home brew free energy FTL transport, space travel will not increase access to unoccupied space, space industry will just be more industry, if it happens it happens but it will not enhance the little of my life that overlaps it.

ruveyn
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20 May 2011, 8:46 pm

Sand wrote:

Robert Goddard and Werner v. Braun were making rockets without the government.

The basic principles of guidance and cooling were found by private efforts.

The electric light bulb and the generating systems that make them glow were developed without the government.

The transistor was invented at Bell Lab, without government oversight.

Automobile and Diesel engines were invented and developed and sold without the government.

The Wright Brothers developed a working flyer with $1200 of their own money.

Langley produced three -failed- airplanes with a $50,000 grant from Congress one year before the Wrights developed a successful flyer with their own money.

and so on and so on and so on.

ruveyn

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20 May 2011, 10:12 pm

Quote:

There is no question that government research has advanced the state of the art in rocketry and space systems. R&D into non-profitable or theoretical areas is one of the best possible uses of government.

On top of that, today's commercial players use NASA derived systems. SpaceX is using NASA developed engines. Bigelow is using NASA developed inflatable hab technology for their space station. ULA, Orbital and SpaceX use government launch facilities, etc.

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