I think the bigger question is what has this country done since this gargatuan achievement 40 years ago? Basically nothing substantial... America has gotten very lazy with the space program. With our technology we should have had colonies on the moon and been walking on Mars and other planets by now, instead of circling around the earth in the Space Shuttle..
Space shuttle development is one of the main reasons our nation took such a big step backwards in space exploration after Apollo. It's a really interesting story to space nuts like me.
Its original intention was never meant to the "space workhorse" it was later developed as. The payload bay was meant to be much smaller, design was very different and the original design was probably a lot safer and more conducive to taking the next step in space transport. The Air Force was involved, though, and made demands on the program.
What they demanded -- ability to launch and retrieve very large spy satellites, ability for a "once around" polar orbit that launched and landed on the West Coast and a few other things really changed the course of NASA development. And not in a good way.
There are a lot of articles about the original space shuttle plans on the Web, and there's a good one in this month's edition of "Air & Space" magazine.
We seem to be finally taking a right step with the Ares program, but it's a shame it's taken so long to plan a return to the moon, it's a shame that it's taking so long to get the new program running.
I'll stop writing now, before I get REALLY long-winded. But this is a topic that has held my fascination all my life. I'm more interested in it than in sports betting, even. And that says a lot...
Wonder what kind of odds I could have gotten on Neil Armstrong stepping out of the module before Buzz Aldrin?
Its original intention was never meant to the "space workhorse" it was later developed as. The payload bay was meant to be much smaller, design was very different and the original design was probably a lot safer and more conducive to taking the next step in space transport. The Air Force was involved, though, and made demands on the program.
What they demanded -- ability to launch and retrieve very large spy satellites, ability for a "once around" polar orbit that launched and landed on the West Coast and a few other things really changed the course of NASA development. And not in a good way.
There are a lot of articles about the original space shuttle plans on the Web, and there's a good one in this month's edition of "Air & Space" magazine.
We seem to be finally taking a right step with the Ares program, but it's a shame it's taken so long to plan a return to the moon, it's a shame that it's taking so long to get the new program running.
I'll stop writing now, before I get REALLY long-winded. But this is a topic that has held my fascination all my life. I'm more interested in it than in sports betting, even. And that says a lot...
Wonder what kind of odds I could have gotten on Neil Armstrong stepping out of the module before Buzz Aldrin?
no chance of mankind ever walking on anything but Mars, or Earth's Moon in our solar system.
The inner planets ( Mercury, Venus), are like 1,000 F,the outer planets ( Jupiter and beyond) are cold and gaseous.
Nobody alive today will be reading Mars Today, maybe man gets the 250,000 miles to the moon, and colonizes it in 100 years, maybe ?
If there is possibly any group I could have less patience with than Creationists, Truthers, and Birthers, it would be the Moon Landing Hoax dickheads.
This was the crowning acheivement in human history, and to deny it is a slap in the face to all who dedicated their life to make it happen.
This was the crowning acheivement in human history, and to deny it is a slap in the face to all who dedicated their life to make it happen.
Don't be so quick to rule out the possibility of terraforming Venus. Though it would be considerably more difficult, expensive and time consuming than Mars, Venus's temperature (850 degrees F) has more to do with the fact that it's atmosphere is mainly Carbon Dioxide than it's proximity to the sun.
I believe that in the context of the human race not even connecting worldwide (circumnavigating the globe routinely) until the early 20th century, we're right on track.
The compounding effect of acquired knowledge and applied knowledge (though the latter seems at times impaired....see WOLFIE's post higher up) can do nothing but guarantee advancement.
And though it's perhaps a trite point of reference, I'm pretty sure the "future" as envisioned by Roddenberry for StarTrek was dated at about 2300 A.D.
Earlier writers such as Asimov and Heinlein had storylines set at a younger date, if I recall correctly - but they were working more speculatively given their work preceded Roddenberry's by 20+ years.
20 years ago I likely qualified as a qualified StarTrek dweeb, but stopped following the various spinoff shows after TNG.
I haven't ever looked, but I'm sure there's got to be any number of websites which provide a breakdown showing the many visions of Roddenberry (and related ST writers) and how close they may be to reality today.
A few that come to mind, which were pure speculative fiction at the time (late 1960s):
1) Video communications
2) Hand held "communicators" (cell phones)
3) Doors that open and close without being touched
4) Complete libraries of books, music and other media being available in a single dekstop location
5) Medical devices which scan the human body (above and beyond the "XRays" available in 1960s) - many of which do not require any actual entry into the body
6) Weapons that temporarily disable, but do not kill or cause permanent damage
shit....Now I got to go find one of those sites
I haven't ever looked, but I'm sure there's got to be any number of websites which provide a breakdown showing the many visions of Roddenberry (and related ST writers) and how close they may be to reality today.
A few that come to mind, which were pure speculative fiction at the time (late 1960s):
1) Video communications
2) Hand held "communicators" (cell phones)
3) Doors that open and close without being touched
4) Complete libraries of books, music and other media being available in a single dekstop location
5) Medical devices which scan the human body (above and beyond the "XRays" available in 1960s) - many of which do not require any actual entry into the body
6) Weapons that temporarily disable, but do not kill or cause permanent damage
shit....Now I got to go find one of those sites
Transporter technology:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/s...-star-trek-teleport-a-step-closer-451673.html
There is one as of right now, currently there are only humans in one place, something terribly bad goes wrong here and we are history. Putting humans in two places gives us a little bit of redundancy. (but of course that is no easy feat since we would have to recreate an entire ecosystem there in order for it to be an actual backup)
Also there are things we can't even imagine now that could be useful in the future , we can't even imagine what sort of things could be done there that could be useful here (like some sort of energy generation that could be easily 'exported' to here?)
Fortunately, people with this attitude won't be the ones working toward these goals. I didn't say anything about starting tomorrow. Both of these goals are at least a hundred years away and will take at least a hundred more to complete. Saying that it's absurd is close-minded and backward thinking.
Do you have any concept, any at all, of the technological hurdles involved? I suppose you read about it, and heard of folks like Sagan talking wistfully about it (and completely out of his ass btw). Do you understand the enormity of setting up even a small continuously inhabitied colony on a place like the moon?
"Well, we put a man on the moon, no reason we can't transform an entire planet!".
Let me put it this way -- it's not our technological shortcomings that will stop us from doing the things you talk. Things like global telecomms and air travel were within our technological reach, we just weren't to that point. Space colonization is also within our technological reach, but the price is prohibitive. Deep space travel isn't just beyond our technological capabilities, it's against the laws of nature. Unless Einstein is proven to be completely wrong, we're not going anywhere.
This is talking about using quantum teleportation using spooky action at a distance. The thing that is interesting about this that the article doesn't mention is that when the state of one photon changes the other changes immediately. While that may not sound phenomenal, what is interesting is that the change occurs faster than the speed of light.
And then there is this, but of course it was probably photoshopped.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8157368.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8157368.stm
