We Stopped Dreaming

Posted by a friend on Facebook, and worthy of reposting here

[YOUTUBE]CbIZU8cQWXc[/YOUTUBE]

-Kevin

Nice

Generally speaking, it was on the mark.

But that was when we, as a nation, feared Soviet expansion and it's attending political ideology.

Can someone make the case that the fear "then" is the fear "now"? Also, the modernity movement ("The Jetsons") is passé. We are in a post-modern culture and it's very hard to "Make the Case for Space", with all of the competing mouths trying to feed at the Public Trough.

Greg

I sure do miss the "good ol days" of the Cold War. Growing up with the competition btwn USA/USSR in everything from Space,Defense, even Hockey seems now not all that fearful as then.(a worthy opponent?) Even with all the Spy vs Spy,Nuke M.A.D. "Red Scare" stuff going on...I believe ther was tremendous RESPECT on both sides...
Something really missing in "Hot" "Military Conflicts"nowdays.

skyspike1 said:

I sure do miss the "good ol days" of the Cold War. Growing up with the competition btwn USA/USSR in everything from Space,Defense, even Hockey seems now not all that fearful as then.(a worthy opponent?) Even with all the Spy vs Spy,Nuke M.A.D. "Red Scare" stuff going on...I believe ther was tremendous RESPECT on both sides...
Something really missing in "Hot" "Military Conflicts"nowdays.

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This is true, because we are not at war against any recognized government, but against thugs and criminals(Iraq). We are at war against an ideal, a group of religious fanatics who have no idea what true religion is(al qaeda, taliban in Afghanistan). How do you beat, defeat, or destroy an ideal?

Very nice piece... somewhat simplistic, but nice... agree with most of it.

I saw this quote awhile back, and it pretty well sums up the difference in mindset... "Back then, we thought we'd be living on the Moon and Mars in 40 years... Now we wonder if we won't be living in caves and riding donkeys in 40 years..." Pretty much spot on.

I agree with the post-modern society idea. We've come so far so fast technologically, we've gotten complacent. We've got bigscreens and Xbox and the latest snazzy stuff, so what do we need with space and the future?? We see the limits and challenges to technological society, and the increasing threats and confluence of factors contributing to its fragility and possible collapse, yet we're powerless to stop it. We have leaders that don't lead, profit takers taking all the profits out of everything, corporations more interested in greed than building the future, a disappearing middle class, an education system that's failing, rich getting richer, poor getting poorer, and a working class being squeezed to pay for it all.

I chalk it up in large part to the death of optimism... or if not its death, its replacement with cynicism, distrust of society and its institutions, and a "turning inwards" that comes from two causes-- 1) segments of society that are "fat and happy" and complacent, and 2) the other parts of society that are too busy trying to make it and keep their heads above water to care. There used to be a MUCH larger middle ground... now, most of the society falls into one of these two categories.

I'm presently reading William Burrows "Exploring Space: Voyages in the Solar System and Beyond". It was published in 1990, and he's saying much the same things in this book that Neil Degrasse Tyson is saying now... it's interesting to remember that when this book was published, we were less than ONE THIRD through the shuttle program's lifetime! The space station (then SS Freedom) was mired in political debate, with nothing happening but constant design, redesign, descoping, and debate. The Soviet Union was about to collapse, and the chapter I'm in now is recounting the statements of frustration coming out of the perestroika era when folks were finally allowed to speak their minds. The Russian scientists were no happier with thier program than the US scientists who had their missions mucked up due to complicated entanglements with the shuttle program, which had been threatening planetary science since the shuttle program began in '72. Even around 1990, folks were saying the shuttle program was a mistake and we should be doing something else. Burrows states that the entire reason for existence and the entire importance of the space program, in both the USSR and the US, were placed in manned flight, despite the fact that very little fundamentally new technologically has been done in that arena since the 80's. He also makes the case that, the leadership in and out of NASA CHOSE to make the "heroes" of the program the astronauts... not the brilliant engineers and scientists making the entire effort possible, and doing the science to glean new knowledge from the experiences of the astronauts and their research which gave the whole exercise meaning for the future beyond political posturing and soft power projection. Hence, the subliminal message to kids coming up is that the rewards go to the "celebrities"-- the sports stars, entertainment celebrities, astronauts, etc... Burrows quotes from "The Right Stuff" that the heroes are those who "put their hides on the line outside the envelope and bring it back". The run-of-the-mill program engineer or scientist can only hope to face the fallout of the continual political tug-of-war between the government leaders and the program leaders over funding and deciding what gets funded and built and what doesn't. He tells of the program scientists and engineers working on Galileo, which basically was an on-again/off-again much delayed political football between the politicians, the program managers, the shuttle program, and the whims and capriciousness of them all and fate itself to delay and stretch out the program by over a decade. Burrows tells of an impromptu poll of the high school and college age kids of many folks involved in that program, and NOT ONE was planning on a future in planetary science or engineering... and those who were planning a career in science or engineering wanted NOTHING to do with NASA... "they wanted a job, but NOT like thier parents!" Kids USED to want to be an astronaut... nowdays, they want to be software developers or computer game designers or other such things.

After 20 years of false starts and canceled programs littering the pages of history, after the loss of not one but TWO shuttles and their crews, we FINALLY retire shuttle, with the "stated purpose" of having a replacement for it ready to go shortly after its retirement. We had a failure of leadership, though, in that replacing the shuttle ASAP was NOT the main priority, so it was cast aside. Politically expedient solutions were preferable to common sense solutions that could be instituted faster and more affordably with a greater likelihood of success. Grandiose plans were substituted for results, and then the promised funding never materialized, problems cropped up and compounded, and the whole thing imploded. Now shuttle is retired, and we're not really any closer to having a replacement for it than when the decision was made. This situation WAS avoidable-- but NOT with the present modus operandii that has passed for "leadership" both within NASA HQ and the Beltway on space issues for the last 40 years.

I've read interesting discussions on whether the Space Race and the success of Apollo was just an unusual "happy accident" of history, or if we've merely been mired in a morass of mediocrity for the last 40 years and will soon "get it together" and pull ourselves up and get going in the right direction again. I think it's increasingly clear that Apollo and the Space Race were "lightning in a bottle", a confluence of events that drove the nation to achieve what was unachievable. Much has been said of the "Sputnik moment" and how that galvanized everything. I think that until we have a "Sputnik moment" of our own, that things are going to remain mired in the bog of institutional bureaucracy, political connections and kickbacks, sacred cows and preferred solutions, going nowhere at great expense.

Sad, but until something FUNDAMENTALLY changes, nothing else will...
Later! OL JR

GregGleason said:

Generally speaking, it was on the mark.

But that was when we, as a nation, feared Soviet expansion and it's attending political ideology.

Can someone make the case that the fear "then" is the fear "now"? Also, the modernity movement ("The Jetsons") is passé. We are in a post-modern culture and it's very hard to "Make the Case for Space", with all of the competing mouths trying to feed at the Public Trough.

Greg

Click to expand...

Not to mention the pitchfork-hoisting mobs screaming they don't want to pay one damn dime of taxes for anything.

There are three groups not just one "pitchfork-hoisting mob"

There are those who are paying taxes and resent where the taxes are going.
The "pitchfork-hoisting mob"

Then there are those who are spending the money. No pitch forks, just the Secret Service.

Then there are those who are receiving the aforementioned tax monies.
The "Vote-hoisting mob"

Sadly Space craft, gantries, bridges, City Water systems, etc. do not vote.

Group one: is mad as hell and are not going to take it anymore!

Group two cares only about the next election and there next term in office.
i.e. Have you ever noticed how all the solutions to the current problem are scheduled for the next guy or gals term.

Group three: Pays no taxes, and does not care about dreams, because they have been so dumbed down, they only aspire to get all the trappings of prosperity, and be on a reality show.

None of the above groups can hear Rod Serling's voice: reading some fitting epitaph to our own apathy.

Scott

as SAC says: None of the above groups can hear Rod Serling's voice: reading some fitting epitaph to our own apathy.
I have been up those stairs, in that building, more than once. "Guess what guys? We're building the Shuttle Mid body! Guess what guys? We're going to Jupiter! and then; "Sorry guys, that's the last Shuttle. Go pose for a picture with that huge fake check and smile." and "Sorry, guys but the Challenger blew up and they've cancelled the Shuttle/Centaur. We're not going to Jupiter after all."
These and a hundred other meetings/rallies/morale boosters never served to disguise the fact we were slowly losing our will to survive in space. Manned Flight Awareness programs were fewer and farther between and robotic missions were simply able to do essentially the same without all the life support and redundancies needed. The joke was you didn't want to be a human factors guy because the robotics lab was perfecting their android.
I am an American Tax Payer and I SHOULD have a vote where my tax money goes, but I don't. People should have food, so I support Welfare. People should have heat and lights, so I support all the taxes the energy companies can think of. I'd rather drive than walk to a launch, so I pay all the local, state and Federal taxes on gasoline-never mind the Multi-National companies dodging thru the loopholes. What I do mind is not having a voice or a choice. Yeah- maybe what Neil said was 'simplistic', but you have to remember his audience.What SAC said is so on the mark and it makes me a little more than sad. It also makes me retired.

luke strawwalker said:

Very nice piece... somewhat simplistic, but nice... agree with most of it.

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What's very impressive to me is that this was totally ex tempore; the audio is clipped from NdG's live interview with Jon Stewart. It's definitely not bad for an elevator pitch.

Excellent, I'm re-posting that on my Facebook page.

Seriously folks; what was the last big technological development that occurred in manned space flight?

To my mind it was being able to build a ‘60s ‘70s mainframe computer in a laptop.
That reduction in volume and mass was probably the biggest reason some of the current crop of competitive manned space vehicles are possible.

Have we really reduced the weight of the materials spacecraft are constructed from significantly since the ‘70s ‘80s?
Have we increased the thrust/weight ratio of the motors significantly? (Total Impulse?)
Have we developed some means to protect astronauts from cosmic rays or solar radiation without shoving them in a “Storm cellar” lined with lead?
How about a constant thrust engine that could get people to Mars in days instead of months or even a year or more?

All the companies competing for a manned space launch vehicle/capsule are pretty much juggling decimal points. Trying to get the lightest possible vehicle that, juuuust doesn’t, fly-apart during lift-off or recovery because it was too fragile. It’s not as if any of them have something really new and outstanding to offer.

Personally I don’t believe that until we can put tons into space at the price we are today putting pounds into space are we going to get very far beyond LEO and un-manned probes.

We need as big a breakthrough in spaceflight technology as the diesel-electric locomotive was over the steam loco or the screw propeller was over the ore.

daveyfire said:

What's very impressive to me is that this was totally ex tempore; the audio is clipped from NdG's live interview with Jon Stewart. It's definitely not bad for an elevator pitch.

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Yes, it was impressive extemporaneous speaking...

What I meant was the argument is simplistic. Most of the reasoning he mentioned is the same stuff NASA has used to justify its own existence and promote its programs, no matter how ill conceived or executed, since the waning days of Apollo, if not before.

Human spaceflight is not ALL of spaceflight. MOST "exploration" is and has been being done by robotic probes, whether flyby, orbital, or landers/rovers. This has been true for the past 40 years, and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Most of the new discoveries and new scientific knowledge is coming from the unmanned side of the space program. Yet, it is the most NEGLECTED side of the space program! It's always underfunded, the first thing to get cut when money gets tight, and is raided like a mattress stash of cash when big manned projects go overbudget or overschedule or usually both. Right now, the unmanned exploration budget has been chopped by 20% in the current budget proposals. No more flagship missions for the foreseeable future, which basically means the next decade since projects launching within that time would have to be greenlighted or in proposal/development stages RIGHT NOW. The Mars robotic program is getting an expensive and time consuming "reboot" (for whatever reason-- seems to me Mars exploration has been the crowning jewel of the space program; why fix what's working beautifully?? :confused2 The manned program has, almost since the shuttle started flying, starting with Reagan's National Aero-Space Plane "flying Orient Express" proposal in the early 80's, been working to develop a shuttle replacement and gone through a plethora of ideas and dozens of billions in development of the various proposals before canceling every single one, save Orion, which is described by the agency as "too expensive to use in LEO-- it's designed for exploration", and which currently has NO manrated launch vehicle and will not for most of a decade. Constellation's implosion is just the latest demonstration of a broken system of codependency between NASA HQ and the federal government and big aerospace contractors. It's rather sickening and rediculous, actually.

SO, we take money away from the part of NASA that IS producing new and exciting results, new discoveries and pushing the frontiers, to spend it on doing laps in LEO doing the same sort of human effects of long duration spaceflight experimentation that's been done aboard various space stations here and in the USSR/Russia for the last FORTY YEARS, planning for human Mars missions in 30 years (just as we have for the last 30 years) while we cannot even afford to maintain our participation in international unmanned exploration projects like ExoMars (with ESA, which we just pulled out of and left our partners high and dry-- what a wonderful way to promote future cooperation in space! Almost as brilliant as the plans to put ISS on the floor of the Pacific in 2014 to pay for Ares V/Altair development after spending 13 years and $100 billion in the US, $25 billion of the international partners money building it! Don't get me wrong... I'm no fan of ISS but having spent the money on it, we need to get SOME use out of it! BUT lets not kid ourselves either... ISS is likely to turn into the same kind of albatross around our neck as shuttle was-- we cannot afford (under the current system) to do exploration and operate/support ISS at the same time, just as we couldn't afford to do exploration and run/support shuttle at the same time. We need to use ISS for as long as it makes realistic sense and then abandon it. The 2020 end-of-life ISS date sounds pretty good to me... if we up it to 2028, like some already want to, kiss manned exploration goodbye, unless you call Apollo 8 do-overs exploration... ).

What is laughable is that while NASA planners and agency leaders give pretty speeches about manned Mars excursions, we cannot even afford to participate in a PARTNERSHIP mission to do an unmanned sample return mission from Mars, which will be several orders of magnitude simpler, cheaper, and easier to accomplish than a manned Mars flight will be... it's patently rediculous... It's akin to someone who can't scrape together gas money to get out of town planning and around the world luxury vacation... :rofl: Yet this is taken SERIOUSLY...

Thing is, we've been here before... history constantly goes in circles. The same jingoistic arguments used to justify the manned space program are being trotted out again, the same overselling and underfunding are being done again, the same robbing from Peter to pay Paul by raiding the unmanned budget for cash to support endless manned program funding needs is being done again, while the most scientifically productive part of NASA is left to wither to support giant manned development projects which basically, at their core, are more about corporate welfare to big aerospace companies than actual exploration or pushing the unknown. It's 1972 all over again, this time with Orion and SLS taking the place of Shuttle and Station. We now have SLS and Orion development, along with ISS operations, soaking up most all the funding for unmanned exploration for the foreseeable future, just as shuttle development and Skylab program expenses soaked up the funding for unmanned exploration in the 70's, or very nearly so... Viking and Voyager very nearly didn't happen-- the two most impressive programs scientifically in space history, had to be desperately fought for to save from the budget axe and then were very nearly starved to death due to shuttle cost overruns. Imagine where we'd be today in terms of knowledge of the solar system (or lack thereof) had Viking never landed on the surface of Mars and its orbiters mapped its surface, and had Voyager never made the Grand Tour of the solar system (which is only possible once every 175 years). We'd have snippets of information from the Pioneers about Jupiter and Saturn, and know NOTHING about Uranus and Neptune beyond what we knew from telescopes. Yet here we are again, the same folks making the same mistakes, all over again... SSDD comes to mind...

There's nothing new under the sun... Later! OL JR

boomtube said:

Seriously folks; what was the last big technological development that occurred in manned space flight?

To my mind it was being able to build a ‘60s ‘70s mainframe computer in a laptop.
That reduction in volume and mass was probably the biggest reason some of the current crop of competitive manned space vehicles are possible.

Have we really reduced the weight of the materials spacecraft are constructed from significantly since the ‘70s ‘80s?

Click to expand...

Well, there are a host of new materials that are quite a bit stronger and lighter than those used in the 70's and 80's, that's for sure... Aluminum/lithium alloys are MUCH lighter than the aluminum alloys used during Apollo. (these were used in the Super Light Weight Tank (SLWT) on shuttle and are used in most of the EELV rockets and new rocket designs like SLS and such). Carbon fiber and other composite materials are also much more advanced than they were then.

boomtube said:

Have we increased the thrust/weight ratio of the motors significantly? (Total Impulse?)

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The SSME is the most advanced engine that's ever been built. Problem is it's rather pricey, but if you simplify the design somewhat and produce them in sufficient quantities to get economies of scale, SUPPOSEDLY the cost can come down to prices comparable to other "cheaper" engines like RS-68 (which was DESIGNED to be cheap, and therefore is a MUCH lower-performing engine in terms of specific impulse, meaning it requires more fuel (and therefore a bigger more expensive rocket) to do the same work. That's the argument anyway; whether history will bear that supposition out remains to be seen. The Russians have the highest thrust/weight ratio engine (NK-33) in history, which is currently being licensed by OSC for their Taurus II vehicle and is supposed to be manufactured in the US by PWR, to be called the RL-500 IIRC... While US engine development has basically withered since the development of SSME (with only the RS-68 being developed to completion and production in that time, IIRC, and the only kerolox engine development in the last 40 years being completed by SpaceX for their Merlin 1 engine-- the only other kerolox engines by the US, the reusable RS-84 design and the TR-107 pintle injected engine, were canceled during early test phases) the Russians have perfected oxygen rich combustion kerosene engines that have world-class performance in terms of thrust to weight, and more importantly, specific impulse (fuel economy). This has largely been the result of their improved understanding of metallurgy, in being able to create metallic coatings on the engine parts that prevent them from melting from running oxygen-rich, which the US has fallen behind on and now we're playing catch-up, because we couldn't build an oxygen-rich combustion kerolox engine that wouldn't melt.

While we have more advanced solid rocket technology than other nations, it's a technology that's rapidly approaching the upper limits of it's capability and the infrastructure required to support it. The ISP will NEVER be as good as competitive liquid propellants (primarily kerolox) and the infrastructure costs to support it make it uncompetitive (which is EXACTLY why the USAF dumped the big segmented solids and adopted the common core liquid fueled booster principle when they developed the EELV rockets to replace the big solid-equipped Titan IV, which had support and launch costs comparable to shuttle, largely because of the big segmented SRM's.

boomtube said:

Have we developed some means to protect astronauts from cosmic rays or solar radiation without shoving them in a “Storm cellar” lined with lead?

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This is incorrect... nobody is seriously contemplating flying a "lead" shelter. The two main radiation hazards in space are 1) solar particle events, like coronal mass ejections (CME's) and 2) galactic cosmic radiation, mostly consisting of heavy ions traveling near the speed of light from supernovas. Solar particle radiation is easier to protect against... since it's coming from the direction of the sun, putting the propellant tanks and stage or other vehicle structures between you and the sun, and staying in their shadow, provides excellent protection. Water is also an excellent shielding material, so having a "shelter" surrounded by the water storage (fresh and/or waste) for the mission would also be a viable design method for shielding. Cosmic radiation is harder to shield against, because it comes more or less equally from ALL directions, so pointing the spacecraft a certain way to "hide in it's shadow" does no good. It's been discovered, however, that using a layer of long-chain polymer plastics (like polyethylene) actually provides pretty decent shielding... in fact it's the main way that will be used to shield against this radiation for the foreseeable future. Of course water or other shielding methods are also helpful, but less practical due to needing to to enclose the entire spacecraft. The worst material is aluminum or metallic structures-- the incoming high-energy particles collide with the atoms/molecules in the alloys and release a shower of secondary radiation particles at high energies. Simply lining the spacecraft with layers of polyethylene linings should help considerably though.

There have been proposals for 'electromagnetic shields' that would theoretically encapsulate a spacecraft in an intense enough magnetic field to divert the charged ionized GCR particles around the spacecraft, thus abating GCR exposure for the crew inside, but the power generation requirements are formidable and the development time and expense will be considerable. Maybe by the latter half of the century it would be practical...

To be continued... OL JR

Continued...

boomtube said:

How about a constant thrust engine that could get people to Mars in days instead of months or even a year or more?

Click to expand...

This is an oft-quoted mantra... in fact Obama pushed for "heavy R&D" into developing "breakthrough technologies" for just such proposals, but the reality is pretty different. Ion engines are, by necessity and the physics involved, inherently low-thrust, meaning that it will take months to accelerate to high velocities anyway. Additionally, you accelerate halfway there, then have to turn around and decelerate the other half of the trip so you're going slow enough to enter orbit. It's not like the Enterprise, instantly going to "warp speed", travelling someplace at a high rate of speed, then instantly 'dropping out of warp' at or near the destination. High thrust engines capable of rapidly accelerating a vehicle to high velocities for the trip, then rapidly decelerating them to enter orbit at the destination exist and have existed since the 60's... they're called NUCLEAR THERMAL PROPULSION engines, BUT they are 'off the table' due to purely political considerations-- the complexities of international relations and the repercussions of putting active nuclear propulsion in space, specifically related to nuclear proliferation in space, is apparent (compared to "passive" nuclear power via RTG's used on spacecraft since the 60's). Also, the environmentalist aspect and public relations nightmare that would result from the launch of fully fueled nuclear propulsion engines would be considerable. Other proposals like VASIMR, while looking good on paper, rely on extremely high energy density/output reactors with extremely high energy output/weight ratios to power them that aren't feasible at present and indeed never may be...

boomtube said:

All the companies competing for a manned space launch vehicle/capsule are pretty much juggling decimal points. Trying to get the lightest possible vehicle that, juuuust doesn’t, fly-apart during lift-off or recovery because it was too fragile. It’s not as if any of them have something really new and outstanding to offer.

Click to expand...

Well, this is as it has been since the beginning... heck the first Mercury capsules didn't have a window to save weight... the engineers couldn't afford the extra weight in the design! Not much has changed since, or is likely to change in the future. Heavier, more robust designs are usually cheaper to design and manufacture, but require a larger, more expensive vehicle to launch, require more fuel to accelerate and decelerate to perform the mission (thus impacting LV design again), and can carry less cargo or equipment on the mission in a 1:1 tradeoff (for a certain amount of lifting capability from the launch vehicle, again, requiring an increase in the LV size to carry more cargo). That's why "battleship design" hasn't been adopted for spacecraft-- whatever you save going to cheaper, heavier designs is spent on larger rockets and less cargo payload. Making things lighter, "just strong enough" as you put it, costs more, but saves more on the rocket design and increases payload capability of the vehicle, and pays off with increased delta-V capability for the spacecraft during the mission as well (or allows more consumables to be carried for longer missions, more instruments or cargo, etc).

boomtube said:

Personally I don’t believe that until we can put tons into space at the price we are today putting pounds into space; we’re not going to get very far beyond LEO and un-manned probes.

We need as big a breakthrough in spaceflight technology as the diesel-electric locomotive was over the steam loco or the screw propeller was over the ore.

Click to expand...

THIS is the key to the whole operation. Get launch costs down enough and ANYTHING becomes possible. "Battleship" spacecraft designs don't chew you up so bad when building a larger propulsion stage to send it someplace beyond Earth and carrying up tons of extra propellant to push it there isn't a costly issue. Building large structures, transporting massive amounts of propellant (most of the weight of missions beyond earth orbit are propellant) and launching/building large or heavy spacecraft or modules for them becomes much more affordable and sustainable. Shuttle tried to realize this paradigm but it never worked as advertised. There were competing ideas, such as minimum cost designs, that were proposed, "big dumb rockets" and other such proposals, that MIGHT have worked... realistically THIS is the sort of thing we should be pursuing if manned space exploration is ever to be an affordable, SUSTAINABLE exercise beyond a few 'boots-n-flags' missions.

Later! OL JR

Begin rant.

IMO the 50s and 60s represent the golden age of the US. We had just come out of WW II and were enjoying a great period of technology development and payback, education and pent up consumer demand. We were paying down the great national debt due to the war (getting financially stable), we were educating the 10,000,000 vets who fought the war (paying forward to keep the future bright), we were rebuilding Europe and Japan (creating future markets), and providing inexpensive housing for the population (the second biggest veterans benefit). As the successfully, newly educated twenty something folks got out of school and got jobs, they used their confidence and talent to develop technology. The consumer never had it better, and there was little inflation, and middle class pay growth was strong.

Yes, there was a cold war, but IMO the space race dominated the 60s. We invested 2.5 to over 5% of the budget each year in the 60s to go to the moon. And we returned that investment 10-fold. The money the government spent for space created good paying science and engineering jobs, but that's not all. These folks purchased home, cars, consumer good and more education for their families, creating even more jobs. New towns, shopping centers, schools popped up all over the country. The auto industry boomed as did the major appliance and electronics industry.

Most families bought a second car, clothes washer and dryers, color TV, freezers, and went away on vacations. Food was never better, more abundant or cheaper. Times were very, very good.

What happened?

Failure of the government to pay for what was spent in Vietnam and corporate and consumer greed. Government made a good case for the Space Race, but did a very poor job justifying Vietnam. They didn't want to raise taxes to fund the war, unlike all previous wars, so they robbed the trust funds and did not sell bonds to insure repayment of the debt, as was done in all previous wars. Coupled to that the larger corporations decided to take more cash out of their coffers to bolster stock prices instead of reinvesting into their corporate R&D to continue product improvements. Labor wanted more pay for less productivity, which ultimately destroyed the steel industry and and put many heavy industries into the second tier of producers.

The 70s were the unmaking of the 60s. The government had eaten up two decades of reserves, and cut NASA and education budgets, damaging our position as premier world manufacturing economy and the leader in technology. Big corporations cut R&D in favor of dividends. Just look a the auto industry. In the 60s they developed the "modern cars", but in the 70s they took a step back wards, not willing to invest in new technology to make cleaner, more efficient engines. They simply added stuff on to 60s designs, making cars that got poorer mileage, and didn't run well. The Japanese and Europeans developed the 70s auto technologies and by the 80s made the better cars.

We borrowed throughout the 70s in an attempt to maintain the golden years. The interest rate quadrupled over the decade, topping out around 20% in 1980-81. In the early 80s the real estate market nosedived, unemployment soared, no one wanted American products. Reagan imposed a number of draconian measures to curb inflation, and raised taxes. The interest rated dropped, but the government continued to spend money it didn't have, and still does, and dropped most industry oversight. Huge concessions were made to business, but little was done to foster R&D, so the corporate coffers continues to be emptied, which has lead to 30 years of government interventions to save banks and manufacturing industries, but until recently just gave the money away to the management that wrecked the business. The only exception has been when the government bailed out the auto industry, they demanded equity and dumped the old management and now that the industry has turned around and created jobs, the government has realize a tidy profit. One of the few bright spots in recent government interventions.

In general, starting in the 70s we have stopped paying forward, replacing future gains for instant gratification. We spend today, living pay check to pay check, and this includes the government. In reality, government spending made the 50s and 60s the golden years, but back then the government knew they had to raise money in order to spend money. This concept was forgotten in the 70s and for the most part persists today. The space race had a 10 year plan, today we're lucky if government looks beyond the next election.

I just heard one of the most ridiculous political statements on the noon news, saying that certain tax exemption cost the MA government billions. What? The legislature's expenditures cost us, the taxpayers money. These idiots we elect have it all wrong. It' not their money, or the government's money, it our money. They are the problem, spending money we have not given them to spend. They continue to spend money on programs that aren't needed such as new buildings and highways, or mismanaged like mandated private insurance health care, but won't spend money on programs desperately needed like infrastructure repair, or single payer health care.

We need programs managed like the 60s space race. The government was the buyer, and industry was the supplier. It was fast paced and highly competitive. In those days, NASA was managed by technocrats, not bureaucrats, with technical expertise and financial authority. They posed the problem, asked industry for solutions by white papers, funded further industry studies from a reduced number of companies to wards a specific focused mission, and then funded a prime and a backup to meet the project goals. If the prime's success was being attained, the backup was cut out, if the prime was failing, the backup was brought in. This lead to the product being developed in the shortest possible time for the lowest dollar expenditure. Project Mercury was abruptly ended well before the planned end when all program goals were reaches, the same with Project Gemini and Apollo. The competition was brutal, but the goals were met and failure was not an option. We need more of this today, not less. There should be no preferred suppliers that can get fat, dumb and happy like we have today. SpaceX is an example of what can be done for less with a lean and mean company in a very short time.

In the 60s we developed 4 manned space systems, culminating with the Saturn 5 and Apollo which was designed and built from the ground up. We couldn't duplicate this in the last decade, even though you could go to the store and buy the parts! What's going on. We are actually much smarter technically today than we were in the 60s,l but we have lost vision, and the ability to make intelligent decisions and stick to them. The bureaucracy is too large, and has too many levels to permit the most efficient technology to be implemented. The large aerospace companies who made the previous systems are considered too large to failure, and given fat new contracts.

It wasn't that way in the 60s and it shouldn't be that way today. SpaceX is doing today, what the aerospace industry did in the 60s using the available knowledge base to develop cost effective hardware, and developing new technology only when the existing technology won't meet the objective. They have done what the established aerospace has not been able to do after spending more than 5 times a much money: build a rocket with manned capability. Ares/Orion has been a dismal failure and and is an example of why you don't need to reinvent the wheel instead of utilizing 7 decades of existing technology. The Falcon 9 and the Dragon, while not fully vetted, are proceeding on a 60s space race time table on a lean mean budget. The big difference is the drive and the desire to succeed, as failure means corporate death. Since Elon Musk, the SpaceX Grand Designer, has slin in the game to the tune of $100,000,000 of his own money, I think he will succeed. SpaceX will be funded by government funds just like the 60s ventures were, but the 60s companies also had skin in the game and their own grand designers, as did NASA in von Braun and company.


History repeats itself.

• The excesses of the 20s and lack of government regulations brought on the stock market crash of 29 and the Great Depression of the 30s.
• The excesses of the last decade resulted in the market crash of 2007 and the current recession.
• Strong leadership and selective government intervention pulled the country out of the Great Depression despite opposition politics to maintain the status quo.
• Hopefully strong leadership and selective government intervention will do the same this time around despite strong opposition from the status quo.

SpaceX is a good example of government funded private industry building a space bus to get to the ISS and LEO. Much more is needed to go backt to the moon or to Mars. There is no logical why we have to build spacecraft the way we do today. We can assemble very large spacecraft in LEO instead or on the ground if we build a Saturn 5 type heavy lift vehicle. Toddy this can be built using COTS parts, and the spacecraft can be built using the shuttle external tank design. Both are cheap and fast track ways back to the moon and Mars. It will take an Apollo level effort and take a decade, not 5 years or 2 or 3 decades. Let's see if SpaceX or someonelse step up and proposes it.

end rant

Bob

I realize that unless we can eliminate or seriously reduce inertia, which at this point is more in the lines of magic than science, we’ll still have to accelerated halfway then turn and decelerate the rest.

But if an engine could be built that allowed for even a half G constant thrust; Mars becomes only days or at most a couple of weeks away. And so does the asteroid belt.

Of course these types of engines only work in space and the really big problem is getting stuff from Earth into space in the first place.

This is where we need that big breakthrough. We have to be able to get away from having to juggle those decimal places. We need to get to the point where if asked to launch a “Battleship” into orbit the question isn’t “Are you out of your frigging mind?” the question is “When and how many?”

In the late 1930s EMD unveiled the first reliable and practical do-everything diesel electric locomotive the “FT”. Others followed and by the late ‘40s early ‘50s American railroads were sending nearly new steam locomotives to the breakers because the cost savings and efficiency of the diesel electric locomotive was so far beyond that of the steamer it was cost effective for the RRs to scrap locomotives that weren’t even paid-off yet.

It is easy to argue that had not the DE locomotive arrived to replace the steamer, today’s economy, productivity and quality of life wouldn’t begin to be possible in fact we would have never attained anything close to what we have today.

This is the kind of technological breakthrough we need in spaceflight. Today’s spacecraft technology is the equivalent of the steam locomotive maybe the equally of the horse drawn wagon. We need a diesel electric locomotive to replace it.

bobkrech said:

Begin rant.

IMO the 50s and 60s represent the golden age of the US. We had just come out of WW II and were enjoying a great period of technology development and payback, education and pent up consumer demand. We were paying down the great national debt due to the war (getting financially stable), we were educating the 10,000,000 vets who fought the war (paying forward to keep the future bright), we were rebuilding Europe and Japan (creating future markets), and providing inexpensive housing for the population (the second biggest veterans benefit). As the successfully, newly educated twenty something folks got out of school and got jobs, they used their confidence and talent to develop technology. The consumer never had it better, and there was little inflation, and middle class pay growth was strong.

Yes, there was a cold war, but IMO the space race dominated the 60s. We invested 2.5 to over 5% of the budget each year in the 60s to go to the moon. And we returned that investment 10-fold. The money the government spent for space created good paying science and engineering jobs, but that's not all. These folks purchased home, cars, consumer good and more education for their families, creating even more jobs. New towns, shopping centers, schools popped up all over the country. The auto industry boomed as did the major appliance and electronics industry.

Most families bought a second car, clothes washer and dryers, color TV, freezers, and went away on vacations. Food was never better, more abundant or cheaper. Times were very, very good.

What happened?

Failure of the government to pay for what was spent in Vietnam and corporate and consumer greed. Government made a good case for the Space Race, but did a very poor job justifying Vietnam. They didn't want to raise taxes to fund the war, unlike all previous wars, so they robbed the trust funds and did not sell bonds to insure repayment of the debt, as was done in all previous wars. Coupled to that the larger corporations decided to take more cash out of their coffers to bolster stock prices instead of reinvesting into their corporate R&D to continue product improvements. Labor wanted more pay for less productivity, which ultimately destroyed the steel industry and and put many heavy industries into the second tier of producers.

The 70s were the unmaking of the 60s. The government had eaten up two decades of reserves, and cut NASA and education budgets, damaging our position as premier world manufacturing economy and the leader in technology. Big corporations cut R&D in favor of dividends. Just look a the auto industry. In the 60s they developed the "modern cars", but in the 70s they took a step back wards, not willing to invest in new technology to make cleaner, more efficient engines. They simply added stuff on to 60s designs, making cars that got poorer mileage, and didn't run well. The Japanese and Europeans developed the 70s auto technologies and by the 80s made the better cars.

We borrowed throughout the 70s in an attempt to maintain the golden years. The interest rate quadrupled over the decade, topping out around 20% in 1980-81. In the early 80s the real estate market nosedived, unemployment soared, no one wanted American products. Reagan imposed a number of draconian measures to curb inflation, and raised taxes. The interest rated dropped, but the government continued to spend money it didn't have, and still does, and dropped most industry oversight. Huge concessions were made to business, but little was done to foster R&D, so the corporate coffers continues to be emptied, which has lead to 30 years of government interventions to save banks and manufacturing industries, but until recently just gave the money away to the management that wrecked the business. The only exception has been when the government bailed out the auto industry, they demanded equity and dumped the old management and now that the industry has turned around and created jobs, the government has realize a tidy profit. One of the few bright spots in recent government interventions.

In general, starting in the 70s we have stopped paying forward, replacing future gains for instant gratification. We spend today, living pay check to pay check, and this includes the government. In reality, government spending made the 50s and 60s the golden years, but back then the government knew they had to raise money in order to spend money. This concept was forgotten in the 70s and for the most part persists today. The space race had a 10 year plan, today we're lucky if government looks beyond the next election.

I just heard one of the most ridiculous political statements on the noon news, saying that certain tax exemption cost the MA government billions. What? The legislature's expenditures cost us, the taxpayers money. These idiots we elect have it all wrong. It' not their money, or the government's money, it our money. They are the problem, spending money we have not given them to spend. They continue to spend money on programs that aren't needed such as new buildings and highways, or mismanaged like mandated private insurance health care, but won't spend money on programs desperately needed like infrastructure repair, or single payer health care.

SpaceX is a good example of government funded private industry building a space bus to get to the ISS and LEO. Much more is needed to go backt to the moon or to Mars. There is no logical why we have to build spacecraft the way we do today. We can assemble very large spacecraft in LEO instead or on the ground if we build a Saturn 5 type heavy lift vehicle. Toddy this can be built using COTS parts, and the spacecraft can be built using the shuttle external tank design. Both are cheap and fast track ways back to the moon and Mars. It will take an Apollo level effort and take a decade, not 5 years or 2 or 3 decades. Let's see if SpaceX or someonelse step up and proposes it.

end rant

Bob

Click to expand...

VERY well said... couldn't agree more...

Thing is, there's one MAJOR difference between the 60's and now... and it segways with what you said... there were no big "aerospace contractors" with huge lobbying efforts and "established space state politicians" tending their parochial interests. Instead, we had big aeronautical/military contractors and a select few politicians on the appropriate committees and representing the requisite areas vying to "get their piece" of the then-new space establishment. Make no mistake, the big aeronautical/military contractors made their presence felt; as the existing cutting edge aircraft manufacturers it largely fell to them to actually build NASA's plans for them, but since it was essentially a "new industry" (space) EVERYBODY was on the ground floor and working up from there. Certainly there were "preferred contractors" even back in the early days... More than a few engineers and astronauts were rather disgusted by the choice of contractors on Apollo and the shuttle, due to clear favoritism over design robustness/engineering elegance. It's only gotten WORSE since then... MUCH MUCH worse.

Now we have parochial interests of politicians and industry lobbyists in essence running the program. And we wonder why the main thing that gets done successfully is spending money... NASA itself is more interested in self preservation and maintaining "ten healthy centers" than in getting lean-n-mean and "getting it done". So long as the system rewards this type of thing, NOTHING will change!

Time to push the "reset" button... Later! OL JR

boomtube said:

I realize that unless we can eliminate or seriously reduce inertia, which at this point is more in the lines of magic than science, we’ll still have to accelerated halfway then turn and decelerate the rest.

But if an engine could be built that allowed for even a half G constant thrust; Mars becomes only days or at most a couple of weeks away. And so does the asteroid belt.

Of course these types of engines only work in space and the really big problem is getting stuff from Earth into space in the first place.

This is where we need that big breakthrough. We have to be able to get away from having to juggle those decimal places. We need to get to the point where if asked to launch a “Battleship” into orbit the question isn’t “Are you out of your frigging mind?” the question is “When and how many?”

In the late 1930s EMD unveiled the first reliable and practical do-everything diesel electric locomotive the “FT”. Others followed and by the late ‘40s early ‘50s American railroads were sending nearly new steam locomotives to the breakers because the cost savings and efficiency of the diesel electric locomotive was so far beyond that of the steamer it was cost effective for the RRs to scrap locomotives that weren’t even paid-off yet.

It is easy to argue that had not the DE locomotive arrived to replace the steamer, today’s economy, productivity and quality of life wouldn’t begin to be possible in fact we would have never attained anything close to what we have today.

This is the kind of technological breakthrough we need in spaceflight. Today’s spacecraft technology is the equivalent of the steam locomotive maybe the equally of the horse drawn wagon. We need a diesel electric locomotive to replace it.

Click to expand...

Sounds good, and you make a relevant point about transportation industry (regarding rail, though I'm not sure how much the allegory holds when lined up with spaceflight). The question is, "How"... where are these "cutting edge" technologies coming from. Sorta sounds awfully 'Star Trek' to me. In the 50's and 60's, all things seemed possible-- space was the new "high frontier" and we were just at the beginning of most of these things (heck even your F unit locos were only a couple decades old or so, and rapid progress in more power and efficiency was being realized with every new model of locomotive that came out. (Yeah, I'm a railfan too). Sheer size and pulling power and efficiency (fuel per ton/mile) was rapidly increasing, because it was mostly the "low hanging fruit" that was being implemented-- the relatively easy incremental upgrades in design and materials that was being discovered, implemented, and finding it's way into practical use. Things have long since plateaued. Oh, sure, power and efficiency per unit weight is still improving slowly, but not at the rates that it was "back then". The technology has matured and reached the point where all the 'low hanging fruit' has been picked-- and no major "technology breakthroughs" appear forthcoming. Barring such a breakthrough, locomotives built 20 years from now are very likely to look more similar to ones built today than the ones built 20 years ago when there was still low hanging fruit left to pick. Make sense??

In the same way, rocket and space development have "plateaued" and reached the top of the bell curve. The physics haven't changed, the rocket equation hasn't changed, and the solutions to the problems haven't changed (chemical powered propulsion). There has been progress in materials science, incorporating new lighter and stronger alloys and materials into designs, improvements in propulsion efficiency and refinement of designs, massive improvement in the weight, size, power, and efficiency of electronics and power supplies, refinement of supporting hardware design, but no new fundamental "breakthroughs" that are really changing things massively. Nor are any particularly likely for the foreseeable future...

This leads us to the present proposals. Obama wanted to cancel Constellation, which he did (it was enormously flawed anyway as Bob pointed out) and basically replace it with "studying" HLV designs for the next 5 years, and with "game changing R&D" for the types of "high thrust high ISP space propulsion" you suggest. Thing is, NASA's been doing STUDIES of this stuff for 50 years! Guess what-- it keeps coming back with the SAME ANSWERS! NASA has studied HLV's alternatives and adjuncts to the shuttle since before the first shuttle ever lifted off-- practically back to when the shuttle program was first approved! There's been a MASSIVE number of shuttle-derived HLV's that have been proposed, vetted, and design work done to various stages. "Shuttle C", the sidemount shuttle HLV whose latest proposal was in the Augustine Commission studies when Obama first took office, has been around literally since before the shuttle ever first flew. "Top Mount" designs like SLS, Ares V, DIRECT, Magnum, Longfellow, National Launch System, etc. have been around almost as long. Heck, in the wake of Challenger, NLS came fairly close to replacing shuttle with something pretty similar to today's SLS vehicle, lofting a new capsule design to replace the shuttle orbiters. Shuttles continued to fly, and after some redesigns and changes, leading to proposals not unlike a modern-day Atlas, with four detachable SSME engines that would parachute into the sea to be reused (potentially) in an outer ring, which dropped off after a couple minutes boosting the core vehicle with two expendable SSME's remaining attached at the base of the core in the middle powering the capsule to orbit. This design persisted and yes, it's cropped up again in the Augustine Committee hearings in the Boeing proposals for the shuttle replacement vehicles, made to Augustine, AIAA, and elsewhere. Another vehicle that was proposed and makes a lot of sense, and basically has been resurrected and re-vetted again in what's called the "Atlas Phase III" design, which would use a shuttle ET diameter core vehicle designed from the shuttle ET, modified for carrying kerosene and LOX fuels, and powered by RD-180 engines. This design hearkens back to the "Jarvis launcher" proposed shortly after Challenger, as a replacement "shuttle derived" vehicle, in this case using an ET-derived core stage redesigned for kerolox propellants, powered by a pair of F-1 engines, with a single J-2S powered upper stage, also 28.6 feet in diameter like the shuttle ET. This design itself dates back basically to the dawn of the Apollo/Saturn program, to the Saturn "C-3" proposal.

The point I'm making is, that basically there is NOTHING to be gained by "further study"... this stuff has been studied to DEATH over the last 40-50 years. Studies on how to go to Mars and elsewhere have been done since the 50's and 60's, and all through the 70's, 80's, 90's, and early 00's. Nothing fundamentally new has been discovered, proposed, or elaborated. A few new innovative combinations have been proposed, such as Zubrin's "Mars Direct" proposal of the 90's, but nothing fundamentally DIFFERENT or groundbreaking from the early proposals.

R&D is certainly a worthwhile endeavor, but hardly exclusive with practical experience and gradual improvement. AFter all, you have to know what works well and what doesn't before you can REALLY know where the best next step is. Like Edison after hundreds of failed experiments to create incandescent bulbs, he said "I didn't fail, I just discovered hundreds of ways NOT to make a light bulb!" We have the benefit of 50 years or more of experience and improvements, so it shouldn't take HUNDREDS of failed attempts to come up with practical solutions and improvements, but without ANY attempts it's reduced merely to a mental exercise.

The space program operates inextricably linked to politics, and operates in a swirl of "buzzwords". "Game changing R&D" is one of these 'buzzwords'... in short, the TRUE definition of it is "not doing anything while waiting for this to be someone else's problem, without the political fallout of cancelling it outright with no replacement in sight". TRUE R&D IS important, but this "proposal" is just the buzzword type...

Later! OL JR

I agree with BobK's assessment. The U.S has atrofied into a huge bulk of nothing! The U.S. has peaked in it's greatness and is in the beginning of it's decline. I don't belive we will recover, we don't seem to learn from our mistakes! Those dooomed....!

dlazarus6660 said:

I agree with BobK's assessment. The U.S has atrofied into a huge bulk of nothing! The U.S. has peaked in it's greatness and is in the beginning of it's decline. I don't belive we will recover, we don't seem to learn from our mistakes! Those dooomed....!

Click to expand...

This is true. The only way to change the inevitable is to have a radical change in the mindset of the people of this country. It would need to happen immediately and frankly I believe our stubborness and greed will prevent that.

Someone wise once said that no democracy can survive once it figures out that it can vote itself an income.

At almost 45, I'm not old enough to remember when our "welfare state" began, but it stands to reason that now it will never go away.

People love the idea(myth) that they can get stuff for free from the government. This current health care garbage is just the latest example. What people hear is "free health care." Never mind that right after the free statement, the next thing is "to pay for it we have to take every penny you make in taxes," people only hear the free part.

Once people have it figured out that they can put decision makers in office who will give them "free" stuff, who ever promises the most "free" stuff will always and forever win the election.

And you guys who talk about our government spending money we haven't given them to spend are so right. But it seems that is exactly what most voters want. The government has two choices: raise taxes or cut spending, and no body wants either. Most want more spending and less taxes.

luke strawwalker said:

Sounds good, and you make a relevant point about transportation industry (regarding rail, though I'm not sure how much the allegory holds when lined up with spaceflight). The question is, "How"... where are these "cutting edge" technologies coming from. Sorta sounds awfully 'Star Trek' to me. In the 50's and 60's, all things seemed possible-- space was the new "high frontier" and we were just at the beginning of most of these things (heck even your F unit locos were only a couple decades old or so, and rapid progress in more power and efficiency was being realized with every new model of locomotive that came out. (Yeah, I'm a railfan too). Sheer size and pulling power and efficiency (fuel per ton/mile) was rapidly increasing, because it was mostly the "low hanging fruit" that was being implemented-- the relatively easy incremental upgrades in design and materials that was being discovered, implemented, and finding it's way into practical use. Things have long since plateaued. Oh, sure, power and efficiency per unit weight is still improving slowly, but not at the rates that it was "back then". The technology has matured and reached the point where all the 'low hanging fruit' has been picked-- and no major "technology breakthroughs" appear forthcoming. Barring such a breakthrough, locomotives built 20 years from now are very likely to look more similar to ones built today than the ones built 20 years ago when there was still low hanging fruit left to pick. Make sense??

In the same way, rocket and space development have "plateaued" and reached the top of the bell curve. The physics haven't changed, the rocket equation hasn't changed, and the solutions to the problems haven't changed (chemical powered propulsion). There has been progress in materials science, incorporating new lighter and stronger alloys and materials into designs, improvements in propulsion efficiency and refinement of designs, massive improvement in the weight, size, power, and efficiency of electronics and power supplies, refinement of supporting hardware design, but no new fundamental "breakthroughs" that are really changing things massively. Nor are any particularly likely for the foreseeable future...

The point I'm making is, that basically there is NOTHING to be gained by "further study"... this stuff has been studied to DEATH over the last 40-50 years. Studies on how to go to Mars and elsewhere have been done since the 50's and 60's, and all through the 70's, 80's, 90's, and early 00's. Nothing fundamentally new has been discovered, proposed, or elaborated. A few new innovative combinations have been proposed, such as Zubrin's "Mars Direct" proposal of the 90's, but nothing fundamentally DIFFERENT or groundbreaking from the early proposals.

R&D is certainly a worthwhile endeavor, but hardly exclusive with practical experience and gradual improvement. AFter all, you have to know what works well and what doesn't before you can REALLY know where the best next step is. Like Edison after hundreds of failed experiments to create incandescent bulbs, he said "I didn't fail, I just discovered hundreds of ways NOT to make a light bulb!" We have the benefit of 50 years or more of experience and improvements, so it shouldn't take HUNDREDS of failed attempts to come up with practical solutions and improvements, but without ANY attempts it's reduced merely to a mental exercise.

The space program operates inextricably linked to politics, and operates in a swirl of "buzzwords". "Game changing R&D" is one of these 'buzzwords'... in short, the TRUE definition of it is "not doing anything while waiting for this to be someone else's problem, without the political fallout of cancelling it outright with no replacement in sight". TRUE R&D IS important, but this "proposal" is just the buzzword type...

Later! OL JR

Click to expand...

The last big breakthrough in locomotive technology was the advent of AC Traction and the use of distributed power; both game changers in the industry but now going on 20/30 years old.
This is still better than any development we’ve had in aerospace in the past 20/30 years. At least with regards to manned space flight or heavy lift to orbit.
If indeed there is not going to be a “Big technological breakthrough” that will allow inexpensive and easy access to LEO and beyond; maybe we’ve inadvertently answered the great conundrum about “Where are the advanced alien races?”
They hit the same technological wall we have. You just can’t get there from here.

Here's a good summary of the US problem in aerospace and what the future holds.

Neil deGrasse Tyson—the acclaimed astrophysicist, writer, and director of the Hayden Planetarium—lays out what it will take for America to remain the leading superpower in space.


There's an economic world war that is as much a threat to the US as previous military wars or the Cold War. The White House and more than half the US Congress are acting like UK's Chamberlain before WWII.

jsdemar said:

Here's a good summary of the US problem in aerospace and what the future holds.

Neil deGrasse Tyson—the acclaimed astrophysicist, writer, and director of the Hayden Planetarium—lays out what it will take for America to remain the leading superpower in space.


There's an economic world war that is as much a threat to the US as previous military wars or the Cold War. The White House and more than half the US Congress are acting like UK's Chamberlain before WWII.

Click to expand...

The demise of the American space program, and American culture in general, reminds me of the 1973 album "How Time Flies" by David Ossman, member of The Firesign Theatre. The hero is an astronaut returning from a 20 year space journey, expecting a hero's welcome, only to find that the space program had long since been dismantled.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbkVYwS2-b0

jsdemar said:

Here's a good summary of the US problem in aerospace and what the future holds.

Neil deGrasse Tyson—the acclaimed astrophysicist, writer, and director of the Hayden Planetarium—lays out what it will take for America to remain the leading superpower in space.


There's an economic world war that is as much a threat to the US as previous military wars or the Cold War. The White House and more than half the US Congress are acting like UK's Chamberlain before WWII.

Click to expand...

Neil deGrasse Tyson said:

If I were the pope of Congress, I would deliver an edict to double NASA’s budget. That would take it to around $40 billion.

Click to expand...

Good luck on that one.

After reading every (and I mean EVERY) post in this thread, it can all be summed up by one simple Quote;

"We have met the enemy, and he is US."

Pogo the Possum

luke strawwalker said:

In the same way, rocket and space development have "plateaued" and reached the top of the bell curve. The physics haven't changed, the rocket equation hasn't changed, and the solutions to the problems haven't changed (chemical powered propulsion).

Click to expand...

I see only 2 possible breakthroughs, a more concentrated energy source - some kind of nuclear but keeping it clean??? The second is a space elevator, the breakthrough would be in materials. As long as we are using chemical rockets, space access will be expensive and dangerous.

Rocketjunkie said:

I see only 2 possible breakthroughs, a more concentrated energy source - some kind of nuclear but keeping it clean??? The second is a space elevator, the breakthrough would be in materials. As long as we are using chemical rockets, space access will be expensive and dangerous.

Click to expand...

You said the "N" word... (not the other one)

If the greenies are scared out of their wits by a few pounds of plutonium inside triple layered super-protected housings with no moving parts, only creating decay heat to drive thermocouples (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators, or RTG's) they would absolutely LOSE THEIR MIND over a "functional" nuclear rocket engine operating in the Earth's atmosphere on an actually flying launch vehicle!

If the word "NUCLEAR" is in it, it's taboo...

Besides, nobody even wants to spring for producing more plutonium for the RTG's, let alone actually do the research for a functional nuclear engine operating beyond Earth orbit... "in the atmosphere" is about as close to a non-starter as you can get...

To lift a page from Star Trek... maybe if you developed fusion Impulse drive...

Later! OL JR

luke strawwalker said:

You said the "N" word... (not the other one)

If the greenies are scared out of their wits by a few pounds of plutonium inside triple layered super-protected housings with no moving parts, only creating decay heat to drive thermocouples (Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generators, or RTG's) they would absolutely LOSE THEIR MIND over a "functional" nuclear rocket engine operating in the Earth's atmosphere on an actually flying launch vehicle!

If the word "NUCLEAR" is in it, it's taboo...

Besides, nobody even wants to spring for producing more plutonium for the RTG's, let alone actually do the research for a functional nuclear engine operating beyond Earth orbit... "in the atmosphere" is about as close to a non-starter as you can get...

To lift a page from Star Trek... maybe if you developed fusion Impulse drive...

Later! OL JR

Click to expand...

Didn't they bring small nuclear heaters on the Apollo missions? and some other flights used them also.

Now we just need ''BIGGER''!