Date: Thu, 25 Mar 93 05:25:58 From: Space Digest maintainer Reply-To: Space-request@isu.isunet.edu Subject: Space Digest V16 #363 To: Space Digest Readers Precedence: bulk Space Digest Thu, 25 Mar 93 Volume 16 : Issue 363 Today's Topics: Alumnium was available in Elizabethan times? Artificial Gravity DC-X Flight time comparison: Voyager vs. Gallileo How to cool Venus Mach 25 NASA Paperwork Need Mir Mirror Information Pioneer Venus Last Findings STS-55 (Columbia) abort (was Aurora?) (3 msgs) STS-55 launch aborted (2 msgs) Time Machine!? (2 msgs) Without a Plan Welcome to the Space Digest!! Please send your messages to "space@isu.isunet.edu", and (un)subscription requests of the form "Subscribe Space " to one of these addresses: listserv@uga (BITNET), rice::boyle (SPAN/NSInet), utadnx::utspan::rice::boyle (THENET), or space-REQUEST@isu.isunet.edu (Internet). ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 24 Mar 93 22:17:43 GMT From: gambit@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu Subject: Alumnium was available in Elizabethan times? Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.materials In article <1on5ljINNm55@gap.caltech.edu> palmer@cco.caltech.edu (David M. Palmer) writes: >cam@hawk.adied.oz.au (The Master) writes: >>Funny how at the time it would have cost an enormous amount of money >>and now it's so cheap. It's almost like thinking of people drinking >>out of gold Coke cans in the future :) > >Gold isn't very useful for Coke cans (not strong enough), but diamond >will be used for all sorts of things, once nanotech comes in. ^^^^^^^^ Has anyone ever defined this term? I seem to be hearing it an awful lot lately. (By the way, am I right in thinking that this came from Maxis' "SimEarth" game?) +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ | Ben Lagow | WecomeintotheworldandtakeourchancesFa | | Grad Res Asst, MatSE | teisjusttheweightofcircumstancesThat' | | U. of Illinois, Urbana | sthewaythatLadyLuckdancesRollthebones | +--------------------------------------------------------------------------+ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 17:56:47 GMT From: Thomas Clarke Subject: Artificial Gravity Newsgroups: sci.space In article <1993Mar23.232400.1423@ee.ubc.ca> neils@ee.ubc.ca (neil storey) writes: > > Since the film "2001" every school-boy has known that the > solution to the problem is simple (at least in principle). One > simply constructs a space station in the form of a torus > and then spins it at an appropriate rate such that > the centrifugal force (caused by the centripetal acceleration) > is equivalent to the force of gravity on earth. Schoolboys in the fifties (even before Sputnik) knew this also from the articles and books put out by VonBraun, Ley and others. In article <1993Mar24.060050.21968@leland.Stanford.EDU> Shannon Thornburg writes: > In article <1993Mar23.232400.1423@ee.ubc.ca> neil storey, neils@ee.ubc.ca > writes: > > < Some valid discussion and calculations relating to > artificial gravity spacecraft deleted > > > >...and I believe that a > >rotation rate of the order of 2 minutes per revolution is the > >maximum thought to be allowable to prevent the astronauts from > >being aware of their own rotation. > >If one accepts this rate of rotation it transpires that to > >achieve full earth gravity a space-station would need a radius > >of nearly 4km. > > Very close. Actually, a rotation of rate of 2 to 3 revolutions per > minute is considered to be acceptable. At 2 rpm, a radius of 224 meters > gives one Earth gravity. An 84 m radius gives one Martian g, which might > be the ideal for a manned Mars mission. .. > Many people have pointed out the > impracticability of attempting to build such a large torus in > space when every piece must be shuttled from earth. Nah, its easy:-) Just connect a bunch of external tanks into a hexagonal or octagonal ring. A circular (gravitationally flat) floor can be laid inside the tanks. I always thought it was a waster to throw all that high-energy aluminum in the ET into the ocean :-( -- Thomas Clarke Institute for Simulation and Training, University of Central FL 12424 Research Parkway, Suite 300, Orlando, FL 32826 (407)658-5030, FAX: (407)658-5059, clarke@acme.ucf.edu ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 16:07:03 GMT From: fred j mccall 575-3539 Subject: DC-X Newsgroups: sci.space In <1oois9INN5bl@zephyr.grace.cri.nz> John R. Manuel writes: >In article I write: >>Are there any articles in Aviation Week, or somewhere similar, about DC-X >>that someone can refer me to? I'm curious to see the design of the thing >>and in particular, how it will manage re-entry and still be re-usable. >I've got a bit more information about DC-X (thanks everyone for the >pointers), but I still have my question about re-entry: how is DC-Y* >going to be able to re-enter the atmosphere without experiencing engine >damage? If it assumes an Apollo-like attitude on re-entry, I'd think that >there would be a lot of ablative damage to the engines. What do the >designers plan to do to prevent such damage and still make DC-Y >immediately reuseable? Hmmm, I thought it was intended to enter nose first and then do a sort of 'tip-up loop' to get the engines under it once it was at lower altitude. However, if it was decided to reenter tail first, from what I understand the engines can be run to form a gas layer around the base that prevents this sort of engine damage -- sounds tricky to me, though. -- "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live in the real world." -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Fred.McCall@dseg.ti.com - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 15:50:54 GMT From: Eric H Seale Subject: Flight time comparison: Voyager vs. Gallileo Newsgroups: sci.space baalke@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov (Ron Baalke) writes: >... An 11 year >drought of new launches ensued from 1978 to 1989 because of this lack >of foresight in having an established launch vehicle available as a backup. A dearth of funding for planetary science didn't help much either. As I recall, Reagan's "Science Advisor" recommended cancelling ALL funding for space science missions in the 80's since it was of no immediate millitary or commercial value (lucky we got anything funded). Of course, there weren't any "new start"s in the late 70's either... My $0.02, Eric Seale ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 20:52:19 GMT From: Paul Dietz Subject: How to cool Venus Newsgroups: sci.space In article <1993Mar24.141613.6149@ke4zv.uucp> gary@ke4zv.UUCP (Gary Coffman) writes: > I think you're wrong about this, in practice if not in principle. > And I'd point to the same Soviet test as a counter argument. It's > been reported that the Soviet test was intended to be a 100 MT > device, but that their hydrocodes weren't advanced enough to > allow them to make a bomb that big that wouldn't disassemble > itself prematurely. And what *I've* heard is that they did not wrap a U-238 blanket around that device (which would have boosted the yield to 100 MT), perhaps because they didn't want that much fallout. Dissassembly is less of a problem in larger devices, since the time it takes to dissassemble increases with device size. > Of course a star is a perfect counterexample > as well. Fusion only occurs in the core areas where both compression > and temperature are extremely high. Trying for an intermediate > yield, between the Soviet bomb and the Sun, presents formidable > technical challenges. Actually, the history of the development of thermonuclear weapons is that big ones were developed first. The first one, a bulky device using liquid deuterium/tritium, achieved 10 MT; the first "dry" bomb with Li6-D achieved 15 MT. Only later were the devices made smaller, prompted in part by the need for smaller reentry vehicles for increasingly accurate MIRVed missiles. The compression bit is simply false. The analogy to a star is bogus, as a star is burning ordinary hydrogen, a far inferior fuel. A big enough thermonuclear bomb need use no compression at all. It's not hard to see why. The rate at which a given mass of fuel is consumed in a plasma of a given composition at a given temperature is proportional to its density (clearly, since doubling the density doubles the rate at which a given nucleus collides with other nuclei). The density does not serve to overcome the coulomb barrier between nuclei; kinetic energy (heat) does that. For example, even in highly compressed (1000x) DT targets for laser fusion, nuclei are still > .1 angstroms apart, on average. The time required for a (nondegenerate) plasma of a given temperature to blow apart is proportional to its linear dimensions, say r. The time required to consume half the fuel is proportional to the density rho. Now, since mass is proportional to r^3 rho, we get that the minimum mass required to fuse a specified fraction of the nuclei before disassembly scales as rho^-2. Laser fusion targets are to achieve yields of about 1 ton of TNT, with about .01 tons of driver energy, with core densities around 1000x normal. Therefore, yields of about 1 MT with a 10 kT driver would naively require no compression (in practice, driving with a bomb is different from driving with lasers, so some compression is required here). But clearly going to still larger bombs gives more slack, as the fuel density stays constant. And we know we can build > 10 MT drivers, so there's three orders of magnitude of slack to play with. (SF story idea: nuclear terrorists steal a multi-MT bomb and hijack the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory, threatening to detonate its 1000 tons of heavy water which, if fully fused, makes a ~10 GT blast and ejects cubic kilometers of rock vapor into the atmosphere.) >> Antimatter would not be sensible, as it would be much too expensive >> to make. > > Today. It will continue to be expensive in energy required, but if > the price of energy is sufficiently low, it might become economical. > There are few technical reasons why an anti-matter explosive can't > be any arbitrary size. Assuming we can make antimatter at .1% efficiency (probably close to the theoretical limit, and much much better than is done today), I compute that for equal sized bombs, electricity costs for antimatter production exceed deuterium separation costs for thermonuclear explosives by about six orders of magnitude (using $.05/kWh for electricity and $2M/ton for deuterium). Is the relative cost really going to change by this much? I doubt it. Paul ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 21:14:27 GMT From: David Geiser Subject: Mach 25 Newsgroups: sci.space Oxymoron: Popular Science -- To know recursion, you must first know recursion. -- ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 16:36:24 GMT From: fred j mccall 575-3539 Subject: NASA Paperwork Newsgroups: sci.space In flb@flb.optiplan.fi ("F.Baube[tm]") writes: >This message might be WAY off base, but .. >Okay, so there's lots of paperwork, and reasons for it. >But lately it seems like when something on a spacecraft is stuck, >a mechanical problem, it was caused by a mallet whack, or the use >of the wrong fastener, or something similarly trivial. Trivial >until a multi-zillion-dollar vehicle has a mechanical failure. >Let's say it was a whack with a mallet to get something to fit. >After the deployment problem, this mallet whack is traced. >Was this mallet whack noted in the paperwork ? >If so .. Who signed off on it ? Wasn't there a procedure to >require an assessment of the possible effect of a mallet whack ? >Or did some assembly tech just do it and not have to tell anyone ? >If the mallet whack wasn't in the paperwork .. Why not ? >In either case, what then is the point of all the paperwork, >if it can't stop simple mechanical problems caused during >spacecraft assembly ? See my .sig. No matter how much cost and paperwork you add to the cycle to try to get there, you simply ain't going to make it. In fact, at some point you become counter-productive as the extra effort to achieve absolute perfection becomes another source for errors. You pays your money and you takes your chances. -- "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live in the real world." -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Fred.McCall@dseg.ti.com - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me. ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 21:27:33 GMT From: Stephen Musko Subject: Need Mir Mirror Information Newsgroups: sci.space Recently a large mirror was deployed from the Mir space station. I'd appreciate any information such as: - Mirror size and pointing accuracy - Mirror materials - And especially: the name and email addr of the Russian principle investigator We are proposing a wind measuring satellite that uses a solar pumped laser and would be most interested in talking with the Russian group responsible for the Mir mirror. Please reply here or to stephen_musko@emal.sprl.umich.edu. Thanks in advance, Steve Musko University of Michigan Space Physics Research Laboratory ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 20:54:27 GMT From: Ron Baalke Subject: Pioneer Venus Last Findings Newsgroups: sci.space,sci.astro,alt.sci.planetary Paula Cleggett-Haleim Headquarters, Washington, D.C. March 24, 1993 (Phone: 202/358-0883) Peter Waller Ames Research Center, Mountain View, Calif. (Phone: 415/604-3938) RELEASE: 93-51 EVIDENCE POINTS TO OCEANS, LIGHTNING ON EARLY VENUS The last findings by the Pioneer Venus Orbiter spacecraft have provided strong new evidence that planet Venus once had three and a half times more water as thought earlier -- enough water to cover the entire surface between 25 and 75 feet deep (762 and 2286 centimeters). These findings also give new support for the presence of lightning on Venus and discoveries about the ionosphere and top of the atmosphere of Venus. Considered Earth's twin planet, Venus today is very dry and searing hot. Pioneer entered Venus' atmosphere on Oct. 8, 1992, and burned up soon after, ending 14 years of exploration. "Many of us have long thought that early in its history Venus had temperate conditions and oceans like Earth's," said Dr. Thomas Donahue, University of Michigan, head of the Pioneer Venus science steering group. "Findings that Venus was once fairly wet does not prove that major oceans existed, but make their existence far more likely," he said. "The new Pioneer data provides evidence that large amounts of water were definitely there," said Donahue. "Most scientists think Venus' early oceans vaporized and 'blew off' 3 billion years ago in a runaway greenhouse effect when the cool early sun increased its luminosity and heated the planet very hot," he said. "The oceans evaporated. Solar ultraviolet radiation split the water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen, and the hydrogen was lost to space. "Pioneer Venus Probe and Orbiter data showed early in the mission," Donahue said, "that on Venus heavy habundant relative to ordinary hydrogen than on Earth and everywhere else we've looked in the solar system -- Mars, Comet Halley, meteorites, Jupiter and Saturn." Venus' remarkable hydrogen/deuterium ratio has since been confirmed by independent measurements. Abundant deuterium is taken as clear evidence that Venus once had 150 times as much water in its atmosphere as today, he said. This is because the water's ordinary hydrogen has escaped. But most of the water's heavy hydrogen (deuterium - twice as heavy as hydrogen) stayed behind because of its weight. When the Orbiter made its final descent to unexplored regions only 80 miles (129 kilometers) above Venus' surface, it found evidence for 3.5 times as much water as previously suggested by the deuterium ratio. "We found a new and important easy-escape mechanism, which accelerates hydrogen and deuterium away from the planet," he said. "This means that much more hydrogen had to escape to build up the present high deuterium concentration. A lot more hydrogen lost means a lot more water early on," he said. "This also rules out theories of a dry-from-the-beginning Venus, whose present meager supply of water comes from an occasional comet impact." The data also show that at Pioneer's lowest altitude 80 miles (129 kilometers) "whistler" radio signals, believed generated by Venus' lightning, were the strongest ever detected. Pioneer has long measured such "lightning" signals. They are the same as the radio signals used in most lightning studies on Earth. In its final orbits, Pioneer penetrated 7 miles (11 kilometers) below the peak of Venus' ionosphere, which tends to block these radio signals. Here also, the magnetic fields which channel the signals were the strongest ever seen on Venus' night side. "These results are best explained by a strong and persistent source of lightning in the Venus atmosphere," said Robert Strangeway of UCLA, Pioneer electric field investigator. Some scientists continue to doubt Venus lightning. They say only optical sightings can prove lightning. A Russian spacecraft has reported visible-light sightings of lightning. Four Russian spacecraft and the U.S. Galileo craft also have observed radio signals believed from lightning. Pioneer found the peak density of Venus' ionosphere for the first time - at 87 miles (139 kilometers). The ionosphere was much different between solar maximum and minimum, which are high and low periods of storm activity on the sun and in the solar wind. At minimum, it was far smaller. It was gone altogether above 85 miles (136 kilometers), and its lower layer was half as dense. It was more variable, much cooler, and full of small structures (1-60 miles in size (1.6-96 kilometers). For the ionosphere on the night side, at solar minimum, hydrogen ions were reduced 20 times. Its lower layer was half as dense as at maximum. Over 3 months, Pioneer provided data from 80 to 210 miles (129 to 336 kilometers) altitude. It found the beginning of Venus' real, mixed atmosphere (transition from oxygen to carbon dioxide) at 80 miles (129 kilometers). Below 85 miles (136 kilometers), it identified various waves and a 4-day oscillation of Venus' atmosphere top. The neutral atmosphere above 185 miles (296 kilometers) was more than 10 times denser and 2120 F (1,000 degrees Celsius) hotter than thought. Working with Donahue were Drs. Richard Hartle and Joseph Grebowsky of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. Ames Research Center manages the Pioneer project for the Office of Space Science, NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C. - end - ___ _____ ___ /_ /| /____/ \ /_ /| Ron Baalke | baalke@kelvin.jpl.nasa.gov | | | | __ \ /| | | | Jet Propulsion Lab | ___| | | | |__) |/ | | |__ M/S 525-3684 Telos | Don't ever take a fence /___| | | | ___/ | |/__ /| Pasadena, CA 91109 | down until you know the |_____|/ |_|/ |_____|/ | reason it was put up. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 16:12:39 GMT From: "Phil G. Fraering" Subject: STS-55 (Columbia) abort (was Aurora?) Newsgroups: sci.space sbooth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Simon E. Booth) writes: >In article <1993Mar22.145826.19194@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> dnadams@nyx.cs.du.edu (Dean Adams) writes: >> >>sbooth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Simon E. Booth) writes: >> >>When you can tell me who the PRIME CONTRACTOR is for your "ufos", YoYoDyne Propulsion Systems, a division of YoYoDyne Aerospace. -- Phil Fraering |"...drag them, kicking and screaming, pgf@srl02.cacs.usl.edu|into the Century of the Fruitbat." - Terry Pratchett, _Reaper Man_ ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 20:34:17 GMT From: "Simon E. Booth" Subject: STS-55 (Columbia) abort (was Aurora?) Newsgroups: sci.space In article henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes: >In article <1993Mar24.043107.1642@ringer.cs.utsa.edu> sbooth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Simon E. Booth) writes: >>My friends and I were debating about whether or not Columbia could have >>reached orbit if the engine failure had occured at T-zero. Once the SRB's >>ignite, they have no choice but to launch. > >No, they can't make orbit with an engine failure at liftoff. I would >think they'd have to do an RTLS abort, after SRB burnout; I don't think >they can even go trans-Atlantic with a failure that early. I've wondered if using strap-on liquid fueled boosters would solve this problem-I mean being commited to launch at T-zero even with a main engine out. Theoretically, liquid fueled boosters could be shut down after ignition, if the shutdown could be performed as quickly as the main engine's was > >An operational space transport system *ought* to be able to reach orbit >with one engine out at liftoff, but the shuttle wasn't designed that way. > >>I shudder to think what an RTLS abort would have been like with the extra >>weight of the Spacelab on board. > >RTLS abort is scary at the best of times. There was a proposal that the >very first launch should be flown as a practice RTLS abort; John Young's Supposedly it's been said that an RTLS abort landing would be near suicidal. I don't remember where I heard this though. I've often wondered why there were no test flights before manned flights started. At least they should have tried one of the Approach and Landing Tests with the Enterprise landing on the KSC shuttle runway. Simon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 16:59:16 GMT From: Henry Spencer Subject: STS-55 (Columbia) abort (was Aurora?) Newsgroups: sci.space In article <1993Mar24.043107.1642@ringer.cs.utsa.edu> sbooth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Simon E. Booth) writes: >My friends and I were debating about whether or not Columbia could have >reached orbit if the engine failure had occured at T-zero. Once the SRB's >ignite, they have no choice but to launch. No, they can't make orbit with an engine failure at liftoff. I would think they'd have to do an RTLS abort, after SRB burnout; I don't think they can even go trans-Atlantic with a failure that early. An operational space transport system *ought* to be able to reach orbit with one engine out at liftoff, but the shuttle wasn't designed that way. >I shudder to think what an RTLS abort would have been like with the extra >weight of the Spacelab on board. RTLS abort is scary at the best of times. There was a proposal that the very first launch should be flown as a practice RTLS abort; John Young's alleged response was "you don't have to practice bleeding!". -- All work is one man's work. | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology - Kipling | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 20:38:55 GMT From: "Simon E. Booth" Subject: STS-55 launch aborted Newsgroups: sci.space In article henry@zoo.toronto.edu (Henry Spencer) writes: >In article <1993Mar24.125531.6557@ringer.cs.utsa.edu> sbooth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Simon E. Booth) writes: >>Incidentally, in the technicl info recently posted to this group on the >>DC spacecraft, it was mentioned that the shuttle program had experience >>a 'near crash' on landing. When was this and which orbiter was involved? > >The one I was thinking of when I wrote that was when Atlantis landed nearly >600ft short of the runway at Edwards in April 1991. Not too bad in itself, >especially on the lakebed, but distinctly unsettling. Heads rolled in >the weather office afterward. Now I know why landings at KSC didn't occur for a while. Much less margin for error than at Edwards... > >There are some other cases you can argue about, like the pilot-induced >oscillation during the landing tests, and Columbia's tire burst at KSC >(which was decidedly scary because the shuttle landing gear has slim >margins -- had it happened a bit earlier, the orbiter might have been If I recall, the tire burst was caused by brakes being overheated. Wasn't this part of the reason KSC landings were prohibited at one point? Were the other orbiter's retrofitted with drag chutes? (I think they should have been installed all along!! ) Simon ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 17:21:32 GMT From: Henry Spencer Subject: STS-55 launch aborted Newsgroups: sci.space In article <1993Mar24.125531.6557@ringer.cs.utsa.edu> sbooth@lonestar.utsa.edu (Simon E. Booth) writes: >Incidentally, in the technicl info recently posted to this group on the >DC spacecraft, it was mentioned that the shuttle program had experience >a 'near crash' on landing. When was this and which orbiter was involved? The one I was thinking of when I wrote that was when Atlantis landed nearly 600ft short of the runway at Edwards in April 1991. Not too bad in itself, especially on the lakebed, but distinctly unsettling. Heads rolled in the weather office afterward. There are some other cases you can argue about, like the pilot-induced oscillation during the landing tests, and Columbia's tire burst at KSC (which was decidedly scary because the shuttle landing gear has slim margins -- had it happened a bit earlier, the orbiter might have been a writeoff). -- All work is one man's work. | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology - Kipling | henry@zoo.toronto.edu utzoo!henry ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 19:04:40 GMT From: Dave Jones Subject: Time Machine!? Newsgroups: sci.space David Lai (davidlai@unixg.ubc.ca) wrote: > Hi netters, > > I remember from my youth, I've been thinking of a time machine > which can go back to the past. I heard from some other people say that > scientists are doing researches and that has something to do with, say, > magnetic fields or magnetic related things. I'm wondering whether there > is actually ANY scientists doing research on time machine? And if so, > how's the progress? > > This should be an interesting question to discuss. Give your > comments! > Its all been theory. There were claims that certain situations, which weren't necessarily practical to engineer, would result in 'timelike world lines' which is jargon for going into your own past. The latest one to appear suggests that one method, involving wormholes connected together and move around each other at high speed, would fail because (if memory serves) the quantum effects resulting from bringing them back together would destroy the setup, in the same way that black holes are supposed to evaporate over time. -- ||Reading online docs is like watching | ||football through a hole in a fence | ||-------------------------------------| ||Dave Jones (dj@ekcolor.ssd.kodak.com)| ------------------------------ Date: 24 Mar 93 17:12:16 GMT From: David Lai Subject: Time Machine!? Newsgroups: sci.space Hi netters, I remember from my youth, I've been thinking of a time machine which can go back to the past. I heard from some other people say that scientists are doing researches and that has something to do with, say, magnetic fields or magnetic related things. I'm wondering whether there is actually ANY scientists doing research on time machine? And if so, how's the progress? This should be an interesting question to discuss. Give your comments! David. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 24 Mar 1993 16:40:03 GMT From: fred j mccall 575-3539 Subject: Without a Plan Newsgroups: sci.space,talk.politics.space In szabo@techbook.com (Nick Szabo) writes: >sysmgr@king.eng.umd.edu (Doug Mohney) writes: >>[Comparing me to Dennis Wingo] >>You've just got your hand out for money for a lot of politically unrealistic >>projects. >This is truly backwards. Dennis Wingo is a bureaucrat working for >NASA, and constantly posting with his hand out, begging money for >obsolete projects costing $100's of billions. You must be reading an entirely different sci.space newsgroup than the rest of us are, Nick. >I volunteer part >of my time designing space projects that _pay for themselves_ by >meeting people's needs in the market, while full time working in the >private sector, producing things people want and need rather than what >politicians think they want and need. And what projects have you flown? I've seen your idea of 'space projects' -- things like Antarctic meteor hunts. >All I ask is that NASA >use its budget more wisely, and devote more of it to projects that >are important to self-sufficient space development, and be far more >open-minded about the wide range of future possibilities for such >development, instead of isolating itself in its own little world of >pork & glory (aka "vision", aka "The Space Program") and demanding >that everybody else to goose-step to their drum. Translation: Nick wants NASA to spend money on what *he* wants them to spend it on and demands that NASA goose-step to his drum. -- "Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live in the real world." -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Fred.McCall@dseg.ti.com - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me. ------------------------------ End of Space Digest Volume 16 : Issue 363 ------------------------------