skip to main |
skip to sidebar
From Gizmodo:
Why We Need to Reach the Stars (and we will)
"...space exploration is the most epic and most important adventure Humanity has ever embarked upon. When we travel to space we are opening the way to the preservation of Humanity. We are trying to contact other civilizations. We are trying to answer the biggest questions of them all: Who are we? Why are we here? How did we get here? Are we alone in this rock we call Earth?"
From Earth To Moon Redux: How The Next Moonshot Will Happen
"May 2019: Our scheduled return to the moon. There's plenty of laboring to be done on the Constellation Program before then, but the foundation is set. Here's how you—as an astronaut—would experience the mission"
Are We Spending Too Much On NASA?
From comments: "1 world, 6.5 billion people and counting. We are spending FAR too little on NASA."
10 Everyday Gadgets with Ties to the Space Program
"Chances are you use a gadget touched by space technology each and every day."
Eating like an Astronaut: Our Six Course Space Food Taste Test
"Eating is one of life's most important activities, and the same applies in space. Every astronaut eats three times a day, and yesterday for lunch, Adam and I had space food. It was awesome."
The Charms of Soyuz: Blasting Off In a Crazy Russian Rocket
"Yesterday, I wrote about what launching aboard a Space Shuttle is like. This time, let's consider the Russian Soyuz rocket and spacecraft. Why? Isn't a rocket a rocket? Is it really that different? Yes and no, no and yes. They both get astronauts into space in around nine minutes. But, they are very different."
Pre-Launch Jitters and Then... Liftoff
"What's it like to go through a launch? How does it feel? Are you able to sleep the night before? Do you get scared? What do you eat before?"
Cassini's Continued Mission from Boston.com's The Big Picture
"NASA's Cassini spacecraft is now a nearly a year into its extended mission, called Cassini Equinox (after its initial 4-year mission ended in June, 2008). The spacecraft continues to operate in good health, returning amazing images of Saturn, its ring system and moons, and providing new information and science on a regular basis. The mission's name, "Equinox" comes from the upcoming Saturnian equinox in August, 2009, when its equator (and rings) will point directly toward the Sun. The Equinox mission runs through September of 2010, with the possibility of further extensions beyond that. Collected here are 24 more intriguing images from our ringed neighbor."
Even more here and here
NASA delivers a little bit for a whole lot of money ?
"It is the same old scam NASA has been playing out for decades — the same one that gave us the shuttle and space station, two of the biggest boondoggles in recent American history.
NASA promises a whole lot for a little bit of money.
And it delivers a little bit for a whole lot of money."
Everett Group's Survey on Space Exploration
Purpose of the study:
- "Gauge Americans’ impressions of the space program relative to other national institutions
- Determine what the public perceives to be the greatest benefits of the space program
- Gauge the level of public support for an increase in funding for the space program
- Identify future missions that the public would support"
"Key Take-Aways
- Most Americans are interested in the space program (60%) but an alarming number have no interest at all (19%). Interest is particularly soft among women.
- On the positive side, large majorities feel that the space program is important to national security (71%), contributes to national pride (79%), and inspires young people to study math and science (82%).
- Half of the public feel that the space program has not directly improved their lives in any way. Those who do, however, cite technological developments and knowledge about the universe.
- Most believe that the U.S. continues to explore space in order to maintain our status as an international leader or because it is human nature to explore."
From the PowerPoint presentation:
From these results it seems that NASA's current mission of returning to the moon is not what the American public considers the best use of its money. It also seems that the public as a whole isn't too sure what they want NASA to do at all.
Link to survey originally found on NASA Watch
After reading the comments to the ABC news question of the day it's encouraging to read so many people supporting our space program, but it worries me to see the comments coming from the people who do not. It seems they think that first of all, NASA's budget is a huge percentage of the federal budget, and second of all they think of the money being spent on the space program is just like throwing money out the window. It seems they have zero comprehension of the idea that all the money that goes into the space program actually is spent here on Earth.
For some time now I've been very concerned that we (as space enthusiasts) have been completely failing at communicating our message to the general public. I've had countless arguments with people who are "anti-space" and I feel that the arguments of inspiration and spin-offs just don't work for them. People need to see more tangible and direct benefits to their lives. They don't understand the value of something that has long-term benefits like the space program. Most worrying of all they have little comprehension of what is going on in space.
In my opinion the three main issues we as space enthusiasts need to tackle are:
- Communication of what we do in space (people barely know what Apollo is. It's amazing how many people don't know we even have a space station and then when they are told are amazed to learn about what we do in space. We can't expect the media to do our work for us. We need to push space exploration religiously ourselves. Our goal should be to educate people about cool things that are done in space on a daily basis.)
- Communication of what NASA costs us as taxpayers (there are two ways to think of NASA's budget: $18 billion or less than 1 penny for every dollar spent on taxes or 0.7 % of the federal budget. Out of context the first number seems huge to the average person. The second number seems like a bargain! Just look at this Wired article that discusses a survey that showed that Americans believed that NASA's budget was one-fourth of the total U.S. budget!: http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2007/11/average-america.html)
- Communication of how our daily lives are affected by space (this is the usual spin-offs discussion)
- Communication of NASA's Return-On-Investment (this is a hard figure to come up with, but if we had it it would be a great one point reply to the nay-sayers)
- Communication of NASA's long term benefits to our nation and the world (in my opinion the hardest of all things to communicate or prove)
Note that the key to all 5 points is communication! If NASA isn't able to promote itself that's no excuse as to why we as private citizens can't do it. Do we really care enough about this issue to do this on our own? Wernher VonBraun spent his entire life as a staunch space advocate, communicating his message within the government and to the general public. He realized that we lived in a democracy and that in the end it was the voice of the people that decided the course we would take. He wrote technical books, science-fiction novels, magazine articles, and even worked with Disney on a series of shows dealing with our future in space. We need to the same. Personally, I'm trying to do my part with my blog and a start up model-rocket club (still in development, but the goal is to teach children the basics of rocketry through community events and online educational videos). I don't think what I'm doing is enough, but I'm trying to take one small step at a time.
With the internet we have the opportunity to communicate our message more effectively than ever. Want to spread the gospel of space? Start a blog, make a YouTube video, participate in online communities, contribute space articles to Digg and Reddit, twitter about space, Facebook about space, MySpace about... space, launch model rockets in your neighborhood (but not at your neighbors), go talk at your local elementary school, be an astronaut for Halloween, celebrate Yuri's night, invite friends over for Shuttle launch viewing parties, communicate, communicate, communicate!
"You must be the change you want to see in the world." - Gandhi
My looooong response to
ABC News Question: Is American's Space Program Worth the Money?Funding AND supporting NASA can help meet 2 out of the 5 main agenda items listed on President Obama's change.gov transition web page:
1) Revitalizing the Economy and 5) Renewing American Global Leadership
We can not be left behind in space after holding such a substantial lead for decades. We (as a country) must continue to push new frontiers and when we have paved the way we should pass it on to private companies who will continue the work and create new jobs and industries. Companies like Scaled Composites, Virgin Galactic, Bigelow Aerospace, and SpaceX are beginning to "settle" on that frontier that NASA first reached in the 1960s. Earth orbit's future is now in the hands of these pioneers.
Now NASA must push beyond Earth orbit and continue our expansion into space. We need to go to the moon and beyond. India and China both have solid plans to send men to the moon by 2020 and the Europeans and Russians have their own goals in regards to the moon as well. In the 1960s and 70s we sent men to the moon and it seemed that there was nothing that could hold back American ingenuity and innovation. The world looked at us in awe. We must not lose this global leadership.
Sending people to the moon would help revitalize our economy because it will create many new jobs to help support this undertaking. We will need all types of people to help build, design, and manage a manned space exploration program to the moon. In addition to that, the space infrastructure that would be created to set up permanent moon bases should also help in the reduction of costs to reach Earth orbit. Lowered costs for reaching Earth orbit can lead to cost savings in the communications industry (which in turn lead to lower costs for all of us). In addition to that, low costs can also lead to the creation of 100% green power sources like Space Solar Power Satellites (Here's a video on that: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YiU9MibyBJ0 and the extensive wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_power_satellite). All that leads to even more economic revitalization.
Also, if you look at it from a longer term perspective, when moon bases become more common (as travel to Earth orbit is becoming today) private corporations will start to pick up where NASA has left off. Why should private corporations go to the moon? Well the moon seems to have huge amounts of Helium-3 under its surface, and on Earth this isotope is very rare. It is hoped that one day (we aren't there yet) this will be used as a fusion power source. How useful can He-3 be for life here on Earth? 25 tons of it (which could be carried back on just one space round trip) can power the entire U.S. for one year. With this amount we could replace all fuels that we pay for essentially making the helium 3 worth about $3 billion per ton. In my opinion He-3 is the reason why so many other countries are in such a rush to get to the moon (see more info below).
In terms of inspiration I can't think of anything more inspiring than continually trying to do the impossible. As JFK once said:
"But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas? We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too. "
In this country we constantly complain about the state of our education and our lack of a new generation of scientists and engineers, but why should our students strive to achieve these careers? Yes, we have many challenges in medicine and energy, and I agree that these are very important and they can be inspiring to many, but exploration and new discoveries are what (in my opinion) have pushed the boundaries of human imagination. You don't see many movies or read many books about the exciting adventures of engineers developing new energy sources, do you? In ancient times people looked at far away mountains and oceans and wondered what was beyond. They wondered and then they worked to find out and in the process pushed mankind forward. If you wanted to know what their goal was they just needed to point to that nearest mountaintop or to the ocean. Today, we can look to the sky and point to the moon.
UPDATE 4/14/09:
Some valuable (official) resources for those of you writing research papers on why we should fund NASA.
Still relevant today 48 years later...
"...I stand here tonight facing west on what was once the last frontier. From the lands that stretch three thousand miles behind us, the pioneers gave up their safety, their comfort and sometimes their lives to build our new West. They were not the captives of their own doubts, nor the prisoners of their own price tags. They were determined to make the new world strong and free -- an example to the world, to overcome its hazards and its hardships, to conquer the enemies that threatened from within and without.
Some would say that those struggles are all over, that all the horizons have been explored, that all the battles have been won, that there is no longer an American frontier. But I trust that no one in this assemblage would agree with that sentiment; for the problems are not all solved and the battles are not all won; and we stand today on the edge of a New Frontier... the frontier of unfilled hopes and unfilled threats...
The New Frontier is here whether we seek it or not.
Beyond that frontier are uncharted areas of science and space, unsolved problems of peace and war, unconquered problems of ignorance and prejudice, unanswered questions of poverty and surplus. It would be easier to shrink from that new frontier, to look to the safe mediocrity of the past, to be lulled by good intentions and high rhetoric...
That is the choice our nation must make -- a choice that lies between the public interest and private comfort, between national greatness and national decline, between the fresh air of progress and the stale, dank atmosphere of "normalcy," between dedication or mediocrity.
All mankind waits upon our decision. A whole world looks to see what we shall do. And we cannot fail that trust. And we cannot fail to try..."
--John F. Kennedy 1960
Spoken at the 1960 Democratic Convention in Los Angeles
Original article and interesting discussion at NASA Watch
From original article:
"In ending, space has one further benefit, wealth. It is the wealth of material resources that will help to fund the future. Nations, like companies and families can only prosper when the bank account is positive. We have had a national negative balance on our checking account for a very long time and it is only a matter of time before those checks start bouncing. It is far past time that we start looking at bringing wealth back to our nation and space and its benefits is the greatest single source of wealth around. Recently the World Wildlife Federation proclaimed that it would take the equivalent of two more earth's to provide for the nine billion people that will live on the earth by 2050. Fortunately, with the dozens of Moon, millions of asteroids, and the inexhaustible energy from the Sun, we have more than enough for all."
