sry if this is old

Quote :

"NASA unveiled plans yesterday to set up a small and ultimately self-sustaining settlement of astronauts at the south pole of the moon sometime around 2020 -- the first step in an ambitious plan to resume manned exploration of the solar system. The long-awaited proposal envisions initial stays of a week by four-person crews, followed by gradually longer visits until power and other supplies are in place to make a permanent presence possible by 2024."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/04/AR2006120400837.html

12/5/2006 2:31:02 PM

[Edited on December 5, 2006 at 2:50 PM. Reason : i'm glad]

12/5/2006 2:44:48 PM

sigh. im an engineer and exploration is cool but i cant imagine the amount of wasted money.....

12/5/2006 3:15:55 PM

They're going to search for that damned monolith.

[Edited on December 5, 2006 at 3:25 PM. Reason : 4]

12/5/2006 3:24:34 PM

Quote :

"self-sustaining"

12/5/2006 3:34:38 PM

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/12/05/news/moon.php

12/5/2006 3:35:58 PM

we shoulda landed on mars 30 years ago

12/5/2006 4:15:02 PM

We should have had our own death star circa 1987.

12/5/2006 4:16:47 PM

granted.. this money could be used in fighting poverty adn the like.. but if there is one thing that bush did that will help "recapture the imagination" as the first space race did. this will. I for one am kinda glad and excited to see people walking on the moon again.

america as a whole needs a reemphasizes on education, that i think this will help to create.

my optimistic view

12/5/2006 6:18:06 PM

this could actually turn out to be self sustaining in every way if they start mining the moon.
but im disappointed that it will take another 15 years to see this.

12/5/2006 6:28:55 PM

12/5/2006 6:32:49 PM

i doubt that.. unless they find some material that is soo valuable in small quantities that it would allow it to be brought back and sold, i dont think that is really feasable. casue it would probably cost a lot more to send back any sort of traditionally known commodaty back. still like the idea though

12/5/2006 8:51:49 PM

Landings by 2020, permanent base by 2024, vehicular activity by 2027.

I'm underwhelmed; Mars would have been such a more interesting target, and if we decided to develop lunar landing capabilities as a fringe benefit alongside the Martian program, so much the better. But a permanent Martian outpost in this timescale would've meant actually increasing NASA funding rather than shuffling money around, plus about five friendly Presidential administrations.

12/5/2006 9:17:44 PM

its easy to mine the moon, just dig up the good stuff then chuck it up in the air, i will land on earth, guaranteed

but seriously this is disappointing, what is the mars timetable now. in the near future its looking like civilian space travel and the moon are gonna get all the attention

12/5/2006 9:25:58 PM

Quote :

"Mars would have been such a more interesting target,"

Quote :

"but seriously this is disappointing, what is the mars timetable now."

Quote :

"NASA unveiled plans yesterday to set up a small and ultimately self-sustaining settlement of astronauts at the south pole of the moon sometime around 2020 -- the first step in an ambitious plan to resume manned exploration of the solar system."

Quote :

"The effort was presented as an unprecedented mission to learn about the moon and places beyond, as well as an integral part of a long-range plan to send astronauts to Mars. The moon settlement would ultimately be a way station for space travelers headed onward, and would provide not only a haven but also hydrogen and oxygen mined from the lunar surface to make water and rocket fuel."

A moon base makes exploration of Mars and beyond much easier. The biggest pain in the ass to space travel right now is escaping Earth's gravity. In order to reach Mars, NASA has to build a pretty damn big spaceship that's able to sustain several astronauts for several months and carry a shitton of fuel. With a moon docking base, they can take up several small parts, assemble them on the moon, and then fire off to Mars without dicking around with Earth's gravity.

Or something like that.

[Edited on December 6, 2006 at 11:34 AM. Reason : ]

12/6/2006 11:31:03 AM

I'd rather see my tax dollars spent on this than on things like new schools. Oh wait, they can just raise the taxes and do both. My bad.

12/6/2006 11:32:59 AM

[Edited on December 6, 2006 at 11:39 AM. Reason : ]

12/6/2006 11:36:33 AM

More like

12/6/2006 11:48:51 AM

The Moon as a staging area for future Mars exploration is a complete red herring. You get even less economy by trying to use the Moon as a staging area for a Mars mission, and you have to push back your Mars mission timetable because you've implicitly made your lunar exploration a prerequisite. When you add in all of this "international partnership" talk, I fully expect these dates to be pushed back in the same way as the International Space Station deadlines kept slipping. This sort of nonsense is one of the things that killed the elder Bush's space exploration plan. If we really want to return to the Moon, and go to Mars, and visit the near-Earth asteroids, we need to develop these programs in parallel, and fund them appropriately.

12/6/2006 12:38:23 PM

If we can get rocket fuel from Moon rocks...this will be a good move

12/6/2006 12:39:35 PM

^^^ Ooo, yeah, I like that one better--an actual scene from the movie.

12/6/2006 7:24:21 PM

Quote :

"unless they find some material that is soo valuable in small quantities that it would allow it to be brought back..."

I WANT MY GODDAM TRITIUM TO POWER MY ITER!

I recommend the anime PlanetES for this subject btw.

12/6/2006 10:04:41 PM

12/6/2006 11:36:36 PM

Quote :

"unless they find some material that is soo valuable in small quantities that it would allow it to be brought back..."

like mitoclorians

12/6/2006 11:54:47 PM

Let me guess, Halliburton will get the $850 billion no-bid contract to provide laundry service on the moon

12/6/2006 11:56:09 PM

If they want a waystation they should just keep the ISS at the end of one of these:



That'd be a lot cheaper.

Really.

12/7/2006 12:00:33 AM

Or just use the Justice League Watchtower:

12/7/2006 12:07:17 AM

12/7/2006 12:10:58 AM

I don't understand why we don't put a station at one of the La Grange points

12/7/2006 12:13:58 AM

I'll see your destroyer, Mr. Joshua. And I'll raise you the starship Enterprise.

12/7/2006 12:17:31 AM

Dammit, why do I have to understand that comment.

Dammit!

12/7/2006 12:17:57 AM

what comment?

12/7/2006 12:20:53 AM

game

set

match

12/7/2006 12:24:22 AM

This is where well film our future mars landing

12/7/2006 12:32:42 AM

Mr. Sulu, raise shields target that Death Star. . .fire phasers--all banks! Prepare photon torpedoes! Kirk to engine room. . .Scottie, I need impulse power now! We've got to get to that channel--if an X-wing fighter can bring down a Death Star, the Enterprise sure as hell can. Mr. Spock. . .Yes, Captain, scanning the vessel now.



[Edited on December 7, 2006 at 12:34 AM. Reason : It's on, Mr. Joshua!]

[Edited on December 7, 2006 at 12:50 AM. Reason : .]

12/7/2006 12:33:00 AM

no its definitely not on

i can't compete with nerdery of that level

12/7/2006 12:39:30 AM

Fire photon torpedoes! Message to the Federation, Lt. Uhura: If the Enterprise is destroyed send a fleet of starships to take out this damn giant eight ball! Dammit, Jim, get a hold of yourself. FUCK OFF, BONES! FIRE, SULU, YOU GAY BASTARD, FIRE!

12/7/2006 12:41:43 AM

i'll raise you a super star destroyer

12/7/2006 12:44:35 AM

Ha! The funny thing is I never have been a nerd--I was a jock in high school. Except for the original Star Trek stuff, I had to look up the other stuff on Google.

12/7/2006 12:45:00 AM

^^ Hmmm? I could unleash the Genesis Device on your vessel and warp the hell out of there. Might work.

12/7/2006 12:48:47 AM

Quote :

"sigh. im an engineer and exploration is cool but i cant imagine the amount of wasted money....."

Yeah, but space exploration precipitates the development of new technologies that are worth the expense. Nearly everything technological we have today owes a little bit to the space program. It should be really interesting to see the new shit that comes out of this.

12/7/2006 12:49:11 AM

^ Agree.

12/7/2006 12:52:23 AM

i wish russia would start a new space race with us

12/7/2006 2:29:00 AM

12/7/2006 2:44:42 AM

you know the beginning of gps was when scientist noticed the doppler effect while tracking sputnik

12/7/2006 3:06:18 AM

No, I didn't--interesting. I did do a project on RFID once, and I mentioned GPS as a related topic.

12/7/2006 3:09:44 AM

RFID?

12/7/2006 3:13:02 AM

GPS satellites also have their internal clocks set to +38 microseconds/day due to general relativity related time differences.

12/7/2006 3:21:51 AM

^^ Radio Frequency Identification. It's been around since at least WWII--we used it to identify our aircraft so we wouldn't shoot down our own planes. Today, RFID, sometimes in conjunction with GPS, is being used in ways that can be so efficient but also scary.

The read rate for RFID is much better than UPC, and you don't have optics to screw with. I mean, you could potentially scan an entire room's worth of inventory from one point--and not have to read each barcode. But consumers' purchases and even their person can be tracked without their knowledge. Hell, there was even a story about cosmetics' executives sitting hundreds of miles from a store watching women interact with their products when the RFID chip activated a camera on the shelf as the product was removed. In addition, book sellers knew how long customers held RFID-tagged books in their hands. And you could be tracked by, say, a known or an unknown RFID tag in the sole of your shoe. You pass by a low-intensity RFID reader--if placed on the ground, it would only have to read a few inches. Then, the reader connects to a GPS transmitter and by satellite tells the tracker where you are--anywhere in the world. It's quite simple, really.

And this is not conspiracy theory bullshit. First, it's not happening in the shadows; it's all out in the open. And second, it's not theory; all of this IS real and it IS happening.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1646921,00.asp

[Edited on December 7, 2006 at 3:52 AM. Reason : Word]

12/7/2006 3:52:01 AM

Set them up

[Edited on December 7, 2006 at 1:07 PM. Reason : silly me]

12/7/2006 1:06:29 PM