Established Member
It is commonplace for scientific investigations to do that. It's a natural consequence of enlarging the field of investigation, either through greater detail,or greater range. If that is what you are referencing then the concern applies to all science. If you meant something else could you give a couple of illustrative examples?Originally Posted by bknight
Established Member
No I'll stick to unmanned instruments.
Order of Kilopi
OK, so you had repeated your statement that unmanned exploration raises more questions than answers. Could you explain what you mean by that?
"I'm planning to live forever. So far, that's working perfectly." Steven Wright
Established Member
It is rather self explanatory I feel.
Established Member
Look if you don't believe that unmanned missions bring up more questions than they answer, fine. I'm through with this particular sub topic sub.
Order of Kilopi
I will be very surprised if both manned and robotic missions don’t bring up more questions than answers. We are exploring new areas. We expect to have more questions than answers.
I am because we are
(African saying)
Order of Kilopi
The next article is a bit of a dampener on NASA's drive for the moon. Only 33 percent of the American public support Moon of Mars exploration.
https://www.wmfe.org/recent-poll-sug...or-mars/175029
Excitement was abundant during the landing of NASA’s newest Martian robotic explorer Perseverance earlier this month, giving high hopes to space enthusiasts that the United States could send humans outside of Earth’s orbit again in the near future.
But new polling data suggests most U.S. adults don’t view human space travel to the moon or Mars as a high priority.
Morning Consult, a privately held data intelligence company based in Washington D.C., conducted a survey among 2,200 U.S. adults in mid-February.
In this poll, they found that only 33 percent of those surveyed supported sending humans to the moon or Mars as a “top” or “important but lower” priority for the U.S. government’s space efforts.
I am because we are
(African saying)
Order of Kilopi
That’s one reason for companies to get into the business for their own purposes. SLS will never be used for commercial purposes even if it gets used by NASA. If companies can make money on their rockets, they will keep developing them (or at least the ones dedicated to new development will) however they do on poll results.
It does sound though that at least currently that NASA is fairly popular with both parties. There are political reasons for support and it isn’t just about what the average citizen thinks.
"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity." — Abraham Lincoln
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?
The Leif Ericson Cruiser
Order of Kilopi
"NASA-funded project to explore one-of-a-kind lunar observatory"
https://www.colorado.edu/today/2021/...ar-observatory
Lunar Resources, Inc., of Houston, Texas, and the University of Colorado Boulder are launching a new research effort to lay the groundwork for a one-of-a-kind lunar radio astronomy observatory—a network of hundreds of miles of antennas constructed on the far side of the moon using materials harvested from the lunar surface itself.
NASA recently awarded the team a $125,000 grant to complete a nine-month study on the project, called the Lunar Farside Radio Observatory, or FarView. The funding is part of the 2021 Phase I NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program. The program is highly competitive with less than 5% of proposals selected for an award.
The NIAC program selects novel concepts to transform future NASA missions with the creation of breakthroughs—such as radically better or entirely new aerospace concepts—while engaging America's innovators and entrepreneurs as partners in the journey. Jack Burns, a professor in the departments of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences and Physics at CU Boulder, developed the concept for the unprecedented observatory.
“FarView will be the most sensitive astronomical observatory in history," said Ronald Polidan, principal investigator of FarView and director of programs at Lunar Resources.
FarView aims to investigate an unexplored period in the history of the universe called the Cosmic Dark Ages. It will identify the conditions and processes under which the first stars, galaxies and accreting black holes formed. That is, however, just the tip of the iceberg, explained Burns, co-investigator on the project.
I am because we are
(African saying)
Moderator
Sixty Minutes (CBS) had a segment about NASA's lunar program last night (LINK). The emphasis was on women involved with the program, but they did at least touch on the problems with the SLS (delays and cost overruns), and the comparison to and competition with commercial rockets like SpaceX. They rather glossed over the problems Boeing has had with Orion. By 60 Minutes standards, this was almost a fluff piece.
Banned
Starliner is Boeing-Orion is LockMart if memory serves. At least a payload will go up for every SLS lost. :-)
Established Member
Russia turns away from NASA, says it will work with China on a Moon base. The heads of the Chinese and Russian space agencies signed an agreement on Tuesday to work together to build a "scientific" station on the Moon. This latest Russia-China agreement suggests the enduring relationship that NASA and Roscosmos have enjoyed for decades may come to a breaking point when it comes to deep space exploration.
Order of Kilopi
Well, the US (fairly) soon will have two crew capsules and has options now for cargo transport, so Russia won’t long be needed even for backup in case something goes wrong with a rocket or capsule, and the ISS partnership will be fading soon. Russia mostly worked with us for the money, and that’s going away. Presumably, China will pay Russia to help given their long experience with astronautics, so it seems a pretty straightforward change. Political friction between Russia and the US matters too.
"The problem with quotes on the Internet is that it is hard to verify their authenticity." — Abraham Lincoln
I say there is an invisible elf in my backyard. How do you prove that I am wrong?
The Leif Ericson Cruiser
Order of Kilopi
The relationship between NASA and Roscosmos endured for purely pragmatic reasons. From the 1990s through the early 2000's the goal from the USA's point of view was to keep Russian rocket engineers looking for employment in the likes of North Korea or Iran. By the time this was less of a consideration NASA had retired the Shuttle and depended on Soyuz to ferry US astronauts to the ISS. Roscosmos saw NASA as a means of acquiring much need funding and progressively upped their prices. Now the USA has its own transport to the ISS, a lot of that Russian expertise has retired without really being replaced. Now of course Roscosmos was looking for a new source of hard currency and China based its own manned program on Russian designs so its a reasonable match up, so long as Roscosmos still has something to offer.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote