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NASA, Black Budgets, Man on Moon/Mars & Science


Ofaebtas

Skilled Investigator
The topic of why NASA and/or simply we (as humans) haven't put a man on the moon for a long time or been more adamant about getting people on Mars comes up time to time.



Some say it's the lack of resources or just the lack of interest since the space war was already fought (and won). Others may go as far as to say of course there are resources and since we don't see a man on Mars, there must be a "black space program" where all the money is going.



I don't know or think I could know who's right or wrong, but a couple of days ago I came across a view that I had never thought about before. (Nor had I never heard this view before, although it may be a common one amongst "real scientists" (for the lack of a much better term). )



That view being something like: They better not waste money and other resources on getting people to the moon or Mars at this point in time, but take those resources and continue doing real scientific exploration and continue developing more kick ass probes, satellites, telescopes, and other data collection and analysation systems. The idea being that it would be "fun" and "cool" to see a person like you and me actually stand on another planet, but the scientific benefits and knowledge gained from an experiment like that would be minuscule compared to the information these more advanced telescopes, probes and satellites could bring us. (And from way farther away than the immediate neighbourhood).



Seems like a valid view.


This all with the disclaimer that I personally don't even know how much money goes into something like NASA every year and how much things like Hubble or some of the new probes/satellites that have been sent further and further actually cost.
 
I think space tech and astronomical investigations are very cool.

If people wish to pay scientists to do those things, they should volunteer the funding, not use force to make other people pay for it.
 
If not for the tech spinoff, I might agree with you. Including, for example, the computer you are using to read this... A dollar spent on NASA has a return of what, 700%? What other program, government or civilian, does that well? I won't get into a "What have the Romans ever done for us?!" listing, but lists of NASA spinoff must be easy to find.
 
This supposes that NASA-funded technological innovations would not have happened without government subsidy. I don't see how that premise can be supported. There are too many millions of innovations that occurred without public subsidy.
 
But STEM major developments typically require funding beyond what church groups and such small fry can get together (crowdfunding before the Internet was minuscule). The computer manufacturers were perfectly content selling huge mainframes to a few dozen huge companies- NASA had to pressure them into making a suitcase-sized multipurpose unit to go on a spacecraft. The paradigm had always been "compute on the ground, radio results up", which wasn't good enough for a trip to the Moon. So NASA got its microchip multi-purpose computer... "A computer, made of *chips*?!" was undoubtedly heard. The computer was so good they used a spare in the first digital fly-by-wire aircraft, successfully- the plane is in a museum, which argues success... I am just using the computer as an example. Who in Monkey's Eyebrow, Kentucky is going to go door-to-door to crowdfund the technological miracles of the future? Who would have done so for even *one* weather satellite, especially one built of discrete transistors? While you are counting the cost of NASA, count the cost of the lives that weather mapping has saved, just as *one* example.
 
Yes NASA funded lots of cool things. That is irrelevant to whether or not these technological innovations would have happened without government subsidy. I don't see how that premise can be supported. There are too many millions of innovations that occurred without public subsidy.
 
Minor, and things promising immediate profit, do get crowdfunded. For everything greater than an improved fishstick, you'd better *hope* NASA or DARPA is working on it... or some such agency. No one was going to stand around in front of grocery stores and rattle cans so there could be TV cameras the size of shoeboxes, back then. The miracles of materials or of technique that NASA, to use my favorite example, created- who can honestly think that they would have been created for the love of pure research, by charities? Or in the hope of next-quarter earnings, by a company?
 
Its plausible USA and other nations such as China, Russia , France have BBP Space Program yes but would the folks behind the curtain tell us doubt it very much and hope its to protect us here on Earth from some unknown threat. Lets hope it's does exist and not a White Elephant when the shit hits the fan.
 
I think the problem goes beyond the scope of funding. Broke and involuted though we are. A big factor discouraging more aggressive exploration of outer space, especially manned exploration, is that the difficulty in going further and further out is so steeply exponential. Sending humans to Mars would be what--ten times as hard as the Apollo missions ? I can't imagine the cost of stretching current technology using strategies such as constant boost powered by fission, solar sails or whatever in multi-generational ships to visit the nearest star. Although I would love to see us make the effort.

Exploring the fringes is mandatory for a civilization looking to the future. I would love to see humans on Mars or colonies on the moon. But at some point, a breakthrough technology is needed to alter the basic cost/benefit equation. The breakthrough would have to be a real game changer, more than a better spacesuit or materials with a "wow" strength to weight ratio.

If the breakthrough is already here in hiding, then we have an entirely new set of problems.
 
FederalBudget.jpg


Looking at this chart, and it's based on the government budget from 2008, science and space research have suffered further budget cuts since then, I can't understand how anyone can honestly think that science is the problem when it comes to things like taxes or government spending. As stated earlier in the thread there has never been a larger return for such a small investment. The idea that private industry would've had any interest whatsoever in say, putting a man on the moon, is completely ludicrous as the technology wasn't to the point where we could capitalize on that very large initial investment, not to mention all of the risk and uncertainty involved. If private industry were funding the initial space program it would've been over with the fire on Apollo I, the lawsuits that they would have been exposed to alone would've been more than enough to bankrupt a private sector company.

With today's technological innovations it's partially a different story, but for funding scientific and technological gain without concern for an immediate return on the investment, who are you going to go to besides the government? The private sector would laugh in your face. This isn't just my opinion, it's the view of most prominent scientists who have spoken on this subject in recent years such as Neil DeGrasse Tyson who argues quite convincingly that private industry simply is not enough.

"Tyson said on a recent video podcast, "It's not possible. Space is dangerous. It's expensive. There are unquantified risks. Combine all of those under one umbrella; you cannot establish a free market capitalization of that enterprise."
Tyson went on to suggest that the history of exploration shows that it is government that mitigates those dangers and quantifies those risks by undertaking voyages of discovery that show the shape of new worlds. He mentioned Columbus, who sailed under the sponsorship of the Spanish crown, as an example. History is replete with examples, however, both before and after Columbus, ranging from Prince Henry the Navigator who opened up ocean trade routes to East India to Lewis and Clarke who blazed the trail to the American West.

Tyson went on to explain that only then does private business move in to start making money, taking advantage of the new opportunities that government sponsored space explorers have created. He is not so much an opponent of commercial space as a critic of how some people believe that it is a panacea ."

You can read more about what Tyson has to say here:Neil deGrasse Tyson says that private business will not open the space frontier - Houston Space news | Examiner.com
 
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For everything greater than an improved fishstick, you'd better *hope* NASA or DARPA is working on it... or some such agency.

Hahahaha. Good one. Because IBM, Pfizer, Mercedes Benz, Cisco, Nike, and Siemens never make anything greater than an improved fishstick.

Are you really, really unaware of who funds and conducts the vast majority of scientific research in the world?
 
IBM, Pfizer, Mercedes Benz, Cisco, Nike, and Siemens never put men on the Moon, robots on Mars or flew a probe out of the Solar System either.
 
IBM, Pfizer, Mercedes Benz, Cisco, Nike, and Siemens never put men on the Moon, robots on Mars or flew a probe out of the Solar System either.

Right, there's a difference between the kinds of science that get funded by private corporations and the kind that gets funded by governments. In commercial research and development, all but the most research-oriented corporations focus more heavily on near-term commercialization possibilities rather than "blue-sky" ideas or technologies, and I think things like a mission to Mars or something similar can definitely be classified as a "blue-sky" idea. Not to mention the fact that with government sponsored researched, the results are publicly shared, whereas with private corporations they belong to a single entity. Government sponsored research can result in huge collaborations that are well beyond the scope of private researchers looking to protect their individual investments and maximize their profits by beating everyone else to market.

Private corporations have yet to take us out of low earth orbit and if you look at what they're working on, most of them aren't planning on doing it anytime soon. I guess it all depends on how long you're willing to wait, but remember, once we've lost our position as a global leader in science and technology, it isn't going to magically come back when we decide to pick it up again, and you need only look at history to see what happens to countries that devalue scientific progress and research, it's not a pretty picture.
 
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Hahahaha. Good one. Because IBM, Pfizer, Mercedes Benz, Cisco, Nike, and Siemens never make anything greater than an improved fishstick.

Are you really, really unaware of who funds and conducts the vast majority of scientific research in the world?

A suggested read is Robert Laughlin's "The Crime Of Reason". Most valuable and sensitive scientific knowledge is controlled not by legal enforcement, but by the power of funding.
 
"Blue Sky" ideas don't seem to be what comes out of the collective anymore. We used to be a nation of dreamers. Now it seems that as long as our favorite sport is there via satellite, (hmmmm? wonder where those came from?) on the weekend and our smart phone is charged up, the world of our little living room, office, car, cocoon, is all we need.
 
The topic of why NASA and/or simply we (as humans) haven't put a man on the moon for a long time or been more adamant about getting people on Mars comes up time to time.

That view being something like: They better not waste money and other resources on getting people to the moon or Mars at this point in time, but take those resources and continue doing real scientific exploration and continue developing more kick ass probes, satellites, telescopes, and other data collection and analysation systems. The idea being that it would be "fun" and "cool" to see a person like you and me actually stand on another planet, but the scientific benefits and knowledge gained from an experiment like that would be minuscule compared to the information these more advanced telescopes, probes and satellites could bring us. (And from way farther away than the immediate neighbourhood).

I think that this is absolutely correct, add to this the fact that no other nation had the intention of colonizing the moon or mars. The whole effort was driven by competition, pride and a fear that the moon was eventually going to become an observation platform or even a place from which to launch nukes.

The moon initiative launched the information age and all it's supporting industries. So it makes sense that we get more information before we go anywhere else. The next step will be enabled by the fusion age which will make trips in space much shorter using fusion propulsion systems. Hopefully we'll have developed better radiation shields by then ;)
 
This supposes that NASA-funded technological innovations would not have happened without government subsidy. I don't see how that premise can be supported. There are too many millions of innovations that occurred without public subsidy.

Sorry Charlie, but the scope of the Apollo Program alone throws serious doubt on your supposition. It's simply not reasonable to believe that without the political will to put a man on the Moon that it would have happened then, and arguing back that it "could" have happened since anyway isn't a valid argument. We can argue that anything "could have happened". It's whether or not it's reasonable to believe it would have happened that matters.
 
I am, myself, philosophically (and perhaps ideologically) an anarchist. But, realistically an advocate of direct democracy. That's neither here or there as far as this thread is concerned. However, neither is the question of private vs. tax payer budget of "space science".

There IS a budget for NASA, and what I found fascinating in the first place was in which ways that budget could be used.

And it's not just about NASA. It's about any program that has the funds to do something with "space science"... where should the funds go?
 
I suspect the reasons for a lack of manned missions to the moon are far more sinister than budgetary problems or cost-benefit ratios. Do you know that some of the astronauts admit to not being able to remember remember their moonwalks? There may be some very strange things on the moon and in space. Not necessarily physical things. Perhaps people lose touch with their humanity and begin changing into something...else. Or perhaps there is physical evidence on the moon that contradicts either scientific orthodoxy (e.g., evidence showing the moon is hollow or an artificial construct of some kind) or shows that other forms of intelligent life exist / have existed in the past.

On a more political note, I cannot help but observe that our supposedly most progressive president of all time, Barack Obama, has gutted NASA on the pretext of focusing on domestic issues like poverty and education. During the Democratic primary debates in 2007, that ridiculous question to Dennis Kucinich--who never stood a chance of being nominated--about UFOs and Obama's response that he doesn't know if there is life on other planets, but he does know that there is life on this planet and it has problems, was likely totally scripted to help give Obama a zinger. Scripted or not, this exchange illustrates how the political elite has no interest in opening up the frontiers of space, just like it has no interest in opening up any real frontiers for human progress. Colonies are inherently deterritorializing and revolutionary, which never serves the interest of the established power structure. Space is the last remaining colony.
 
I suspect the reasons for a lack of manned missions to the moon are far more sinister than budgetary problems or cost-benefit ratios. Do you know that some of the astronauts admit to not being able to remember remember their moonwalks?

I still say the Apollo astronauts underwent permanent personality changes that have yet to be fully explained.
 
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