Why haven't we been back to the Moon?

Maybe.

Like I said...cynical.

Oh and I work at the Open University where the Beagle 2 thingy is being made

Not that thats impressive or anything LMAO

 

why have the americans not gone back to the moon?

easy - there is no oil on the moon, yes?

 

Touché LMFAO

 

There's nothing on the moon. Just rock and dirt. No atmoshphere so there's no biological entities or anything. What does oil have to do with it?

They did discover some water on the south pole of the moon a while back. That might be useful someday as fuel. Eventually the moon might be used as a way-station for further space exploration. It would definitely be interesting.

But for now I wonder what the fate of the international space station will be with NASA shuttles grounded. Hopefully it will continue to build to finish.

 

But for now I wonder what the fate of the international space station will be with NASA shuttles grounded. Hopefully it will continue to build to finish.

It will. The Shuttle is our only heavy-lifting vehicle. We cannot afford not to have it in operation. We need it too much. It is the only vehicle that can lift objects like the Hubble and the ISS into orbit.

Why do we need it? Why bother with space? The government has at least one good reason now. We are on the verge of a new space race.

China will launch its first man into orbit this year. Their plan is to have a man on the moon by 2010, and a colony shortly after. We cannot allow them to be the only ones with access to space. That would be political and military suicide for the US. We cannot let them do all of that unopposed.

Kimball Kinnison

 

China will launch its first man into orbit this year. Their plan is to have a man on the moon by 2010, and a colony shortly after. We cannot allow them to be the only ones with access to space. That would be political and military suicide for the US. We cannot let them do all of that unopposed.


Oh dear.

We cannot...

...military suicide for the US

We cannot let them do all of that unopposed

So many things in those 3 lines that make my toes curl up and me want to hit my head off sharp things.

When did US own space?

Why must you not allow China (or anyone) to land/colonise/whatever?

 

So many things in those 3 lines that make my toes curl up and me want to hit my head off sharp things.

When did US own space?

Why must you not allow China (or anyone) to land/colonise/whatever?

It is not that we cannot allow them to do it, it is that we cannot allow them to be the only ones to do it.

One of the big reasons that space has remained (for the most part) demilitarized is because during the Cold War both the US and the USSR we trying to reach space at the same time. If one or the other had reached there unopposed, we would have seen weapons placed there that could have guaranteed victory and first stike capabilities for one side.

If we abandon space as the Chinese begin their manned space program, that same threat exists. We cannot let them do that unopposed for both political and military reasons. Why? Because that is the only way to guarantee that space will not be owned by any one company.

It is not that we will try to stop them, but that we will either be there ahead of them or along side of them every step of the way. As it is, there is a good chance they could beat us back to the moon.

Like I said, we are on the verge of a new space race.

Kimball Kinnison

 

The shuttle is not only a heavy lift vehicle, but it is already a flying space station. Any experiment that will be conducted on the station could have been done with the shuttle. Also, the shuttle is not the only heavy lift vehicle in the NASA inventory.

The Moon does have things besides rock and dirt, please see my post above.

We will need a station at some point. Once again The Space Island Group's idea in using the shuttle's expendable fuel tank is the best yet. Space Island Group

China is, well, not exactly a threat to us, however it is a little worrisome to have another country have more activity in space that could lead to militerization. It is sort of hard to say if this will really happen though.

 

When did US own space?

Why must you not allow China (or anyone) to land/colonise/whatever?

That's exactly the problem. If the U.S. doesn't own space, why should China be able to? It's more a matter of the U.S. keeping one finger in the pot.

 

In my last post, it read:

If we abandon space as the Chinese begin their manned space program, that same threat exists. We cannot let them do that unopposed for both political and military reasons. Why? Because that is the only way to guarantee that space will not be owned by any one company.

It should read:

If we abandon space as the Chinese begin their manned space program, that same threat exists. We cannot let them do that unopposed for both political and military reasons. Why? Because that is the only way to guarantee that space will not be owned by any one country.

Thank you.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled flame war.

Kimball Kinnison

 

A new space race? Great! Go for it!

Are the Chinese really going to build a colony on the Moon? Whoa. It means that the US has to do it too,
if I understood your posts correctly, Kimball.

"If the U.S. doesn't own space, why should China be able to?"
Where do we need the US in space? It could as well be China and Russia, or China and India, or Russia & India etc.
IMO, no one should own space.
Demilitarize space immediately!

 

If you look at the scientiffic evidence it is clear that the landings never took place.

Go on. Phone Nasa and ask them what shielding a camera on the moon would need. Then check what was used on the landings.....
Or check how thick a space suit would have had to of been to protect against the radiation on the moon.......................
or check one of many other things..

Though we have clearly landed probes on the moon there have been no manned landings.

 

Some articles about China's plans for space:

China poised to enter space race

China confirms all systems go on manned space flight

My personal prediction is that we will have another shuttle in orbit before the Chinese launch their attempt in October. Depending on the success of that, we will begin a new focus on returning to the moon, either before or along side of the Chinese, and establishing a base there.

Kimball Kinnison

 

Because they found a monolith there, and must keep it hush-hush?

Same reason we don't send people to Mars - because of proof there (the Face, etc.) that we're not alone?

Maybe (as in the X-Files episode, "Space") the E.T.'s don't want our violent species to leave earth?

Or - as said in the film, 'The Right Stuff', "No Bucks = No Buck Rogers!"

 

From Space.com:

New Mars Exploration Strategy Blueprinted
By Leonard David
Senior Space Writer
posted: 07:01 am ET
18 February 2003

A specially convened group of scientists has advised NASA on how the agency might proceed in exploring Mars into the next decade.

Raymond Arvidson, Chair of the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences in Arts & Sciences at Washington University in St. Louis, chaired the "Pathways" science working group. Details of the Mars task force were released February 15 at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting held in Denver, Colorado.

Arvidson said the Pathways group plotted out a new "discovery-driven" agenda with the assumption that both the twin Mars Exploration Rovers next year and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter in 2005 will return loads of data.


What is now needed is a flexible plan to explore Mars, Arvidson explained.

One pathway might be to continue to focus on sites where evidence of past lakes or hydrothermal waters reaching the surface have been preserved. Another line of attack might be to probe the interior of the planet by using geophysical techniques and drilling. Doing so could help uncover shallow water tables and other water-related alterations, past or present, Arvidson said.

A third scenario could focus on polar ices and niches for life on Mars. A search for evidence of recent liquid water and possible biosignatures and habitats would be undertaken.

"The goal of the discovery-driven pathways is to develop a set of possible mission scenarios that optimally seek and hopefully confirm the presence of biosignatures related to the formation and evolution of life," Arvidson explained.

"Sending humans to Mars will happen sooner rather than later if we find evidence for past or present life or even if we find strong evidence that organic compounds have been preserved in settings such as ancient lake beds or hydrothermal systems," Arvidson concluded.

I agree with that last part. The two probes mentioned are the ones that many of us put our names on a few months ago.

 

toochilled: If you look at the scientiffic evidence it is clear that the landings never took place.

Could you post a link to a source? I believe it's within the realm of possibility but incredibly unlikely. The US and Russia were in a space race. One way to end the race would be to make it look like you were the first one there. Faking one mission is unlikely enough, but all of them?


Thanks for the articles on China, Kimball_Kinnison. I hope that the US will have another shuttle up before long. I'm curious though as to what Chinese space men will be called. The US have their astronauts, the Russians their cosmonauts. Or perhaps that's just a leftover from the Cold War.


VadersLaMent: The two probes mentioned are the ones that many of us put our names on a few months ago.

I forgot about that. Sweet. Personally I think it will be quite a while before we ever send a man to Mars. It's quite a bit harder than to send him to the moon.

 

The Chinese astronauts are called yuhangyuan, but that simply translates to astronaut.

Astronaut and cosmonaut both go back to greek (a relative of both english and russian). Astronaut is a "sailor of the stars" and cosmonaut is a "sailor of space". Since we haven't actually sent anyone to another star, all astronauts are (technically speaking) cosmonauts.

I hope that helps.

Kimball Kinnison

 

NASA sems to be waiting on two things to attempt a Mars shot.

One is a plasma rocket that could get to Mars in approx 3 months instead of 6 to 8 months with conventional rockets. This is being developed right now.

The other is NASA trying to get nuclear power into space. This is just now going through red tape.

 

It's not just red tape: it's the environmental movement that is preventing such nuclear power rockets.

The Cassini space probe that is currently racing to Saturn at an unprecidented pace thanks to nuclear power was almost scrapped at a loss of some 4 billion dollars, if not more. That includes the operational costs, developements costs, so on and so forth. The reason: the outbound thruster engine uses plutonium as it's main thrusting source. The biggest fear and Greenpeace's biggest poop in the courts was that if the rocket exploded the 250 pounds of plutonium would splatter about, and the higher up in the sky the worse off the damage spread would be. In essence, it would be what folks would call a Dirty Bomb. They have a valid point on that regard, so therefore I would urge scientist and engineers to continue their fusion power research.

- Folks' are interested in space exploration, yes, but here is why they don't push harder for it even with the current global climate: no Joe or Jane Normal has gone into space. Around the time of Apollo, the idea was in 30 years the Moon would be colonized. So, in the year 1999, we should have been seeing some lights glowing off the surface of the Moon. Space itself is still an unknown quantity that can't be taken lightly; it gets more dangerous when folks think they 'know enough' about it, especially in regards to the Moon. That, the Moon, is our priliminary test. Granted its nothing like Mars, but if we can't do the things we want in some degree on Mars on the Moon then we have to get back to the drawing board.

But anyhoot, the risks are too high in NASA's opinion just to let Joe and Jane Normal go up. Private industry has been looking at this for twenty years now and at an investment stand point it's not doable. Not now. And besides that there are the problems of lawsuits; all it takes is one disaster with regulars up there and regardless if waivers were signed and wills were made saying don't sue folks will sue and sue away.

Yes, we've been there and done that, but honestly we didn't do jack squat on the Moon. Rock samples? Sure. Gravity tests? Absolute: which by the way is the proof that it wasn't done on a sound stage in Hollywood, and the fact that other countries throughout the world with transceivers were picking up the astronaunts radio signals from the Moon is a factoid the conspiracy theorist always forget about in their rants; the whole world can't be lying about that now, can they? Even the Soviet Union at that time acknowledged the achievement in defeat.

As for China going into space; you're welcome! I know you couldn't do it without our missile technology. But the fact remains is this: you got a satillite up, can you get a man or woman up, keep them up there, and then safely bring them back down? And, if you go through all the stuff we did and Russia did and the European Space Agency has gone through to reach that pinnacle called 'acceptable flight risk' will you ultimately achieve your goal in the time aloated? My guess: colonizing on the Moon won't happen by 2010.

Not until we know as much as we can about the Moon, because we still don't know squat.

 

FlamingSword Could you post a link to a source?

There is no evidence that proves that man didn't go to the moon, but at the same time there is no evidence that man did go to the moon.

Yes, yes, I'm sure there are some pretty pictures on the NASA website, but its nothing that couldn't be been knocked up in Photoshop.

Faking one mission is unlikely enough, but all of them?

Flawed logic. If you faked one and got away with it, then why not fake more of them ? Whats to say they didn't film all of the moon landings at the same time, then just release the footage in line with each Apollo mission.


There are two points on view on the subject. The first being that man went to the moon, took pictures and moon rock, played some golf then came home again. The other is that the levels of solar radiation that the moon is subjected to would be lethal to any biological organism that walked on its surface (and would destroy any photograph film used).

The people on each side of the debate will never agree.

Only thing I can add from personal experience is that an old Professor of mine worked for NASA and he believed the moon landings were faked - he even admitted it to us after a lecture once.

malkie

 

Actually NASA fully ndorses the "average joe" of private companies producing their own launch vehicles. Three are scheduled this year for their first launches.

I might should have typed "red tape" to include those who oppose nuclear power. But NASA will do it anyway.

Much of the population of the Earth has a teeny tiny little bitty bit of plutonium in them from a similar RTG powered probe that broke up upon launch some many years ago, I forget the date, sorry.

 

Maybe I'm a little slow, but what's a moon base going to do anyway? What is the point of going to the moon?

 

A base on the dark side of the Moon would be an ideal site for astronomy, far from the light and radio noise of Earth.

The Moon also has Helium-3 in its soil which could power fusion reactors.

Anyone else have some reasons for a Moon base?

 

The 1/6 gravity is healthier then the 0 g of orbit.

And of course the physical presence there is a betetr way to spend money hen to send someone to mars just so we can bring them all the way back.

Think about it. It's a multiple month trip both ways and to make it useful they have to spend more then a few days there, what experience do we have surviving on a different planet for more then a few days?

Heck, if you want to think about it we orbittd the moon with several missions before attempting a landing.

Tell me this, what does landing on Mars accomplish if you just leave again? Is it just tourism?

 

With 1/6 gravity, people would live a lot longer on the moon!