IntenseDebate - derekl1963

3 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: NASA... · 1 reply · +6 points

"I don’t think I’d have become a passionate space devotee if I was left waiting for days without being able to see the photos from Spirit and Opportunity."

Yet, somehow, those of us who grew up when we might wait weeks, months, *years* to see a tiny fraction of the imagery be published in the newspaper, a magazine, or a book became passionate about space as well.

I don't see a NASA problem here. I see an instant gratification problem. I see the Twiterati and Very Online crowd being frustrated because NASA won't provide them with justification for their existence. I see a return of the fallacy that public opinion is absolutely vital for our Bold Future In Space.

3 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: If w... · 1 reply · +3 points

Ah, yes... the same nonsense the space advocacy community has been peddling for years. "If we can just get the public involved! Everything will be golden!".

No. It. Won't. The public doesn't care beyond a nine days wonder (nine minutes in today's fast forward environment). Lack of imagery and lyrical prose didn't kill what little public interest there was in the 70's, and it won't generate it today.

3 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Nati... · 0 replies · +1 points

"One of the things I've often wondered is whether it wouldn't be more appropriate to treat spacecraft more like bases and less like vehicles. Like, you don't launch and fly an AEHF-class satellite, you use a rocket to deploy an AEHF-class spaceborne radio station, call it Air Force Base McGonigle or something."

Or treat them as vehicles - exactly as the Navy does it's ships.

Or, to put it another way, you're correct that the current paradigm of treating them like high flying aircraft is broken... But they're still deployed vehicles. And the Chair Force Way isn't the only way.

3 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Revi... · 0 replies · +3 points

Setting aside that they should never have received the shock in the first place... (A shock is indication that _something_ is broken somewhere along the line.) If someone received an electrical shock, that is unsafe by definition. (And I find your qualification "overly unsafe" interesting.) Even seemingly minor electrical shocks can have unforeseen consequences.

"We had no problems, nor did 5 other missions."

Neither o-rings nor foam strikes caused a problem - until the day they did.

3 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Revi... · 0 replies · +6 points

Not much hard physical work on a SSBN <mumble> feet under the North Atlantic. I essentially had a desk job.

And while our menu was limited to some extent, there really wasn't a lack of variety. That's why I'm curious why the lack on HIGH-SEAS and by extension the ISS. Is it a technical limitation? (Types of food available, preservation or storage techniques.) Or is it a failure in menu planning?

3 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Hand... · 0 replies · +3 points

Yes, Soyuz was intended to be part of the lunar mission. But that version of Soyuz never flew. By the time of ASTP it was a dedicated general purpose LEO orbiter... But it can't even do that now, it's evolved into a dedicated station taxi.

3 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Revi... · 6 replies · +7 points

"The HI-SEAS study, Greene writes, has its roots in something called “menu fatigue,” where astronauts on long-duration space station missions eat less food over time because of a lack of variety."

That would be interesting to learn more about. I don't recall it ever being a problem in the Navy.

"HI-SEAS has also changed: a sixth mission, slated to last eight months, ended just days after it began in early 2018 when a one person was injured, requiring a brief hospitalization"

Shouldn't beat around the bush here. The individual was electrocuted because of a poorly designed/installed/maintained electrical service problem. (IIRC, it was a known problem, but I wouldn't swear to that.) There was massive confusion because the habitat had a poorly designed (and, IIRC, never tested) emergency plan. Further confusion arose when it turned out the outside agencies they were supposed to contact/cooperate with/rely on in the event of an emergency turned out to be blithely unaware they were involved in the plan(s) at all.

It was a massive cock-up, and they're lucky it wasn't more serious.

4 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Revi... · 0 replies · +1 points

"Why you go to Moon is if there is mineable water."

And...? I mean, you state that as an absolute - as if mining water were a worthy goal in and of itself.

4 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Why ... · 0 replies · +14 points

Ninety nine percent of the article is fluff, irrelevant to the question of whether a business case is required. The remaining one percent is smoke and mirrors dodging around the question. Somewhere in the rounding error is the true message of the article - blind faith that a business case will emerge out of thin air when one is required.

4 years ago @ The Space Review: essa... - The Space Review: Wasn... · 1 reply · +6 points

"Moore has said that the show is intended to depict a world that leads to Star Trek. But Star Trek, until the past decade or so, was a positive vision of the future where humanity not only failed to blow itself up, but had rid itself of conflict and scarcity. For All Mankind, although depicting the kind of space program that many have daydreamed about, shows a darker world not of cooperation in space, but realpolitik competition."

Eugenics War (Space Seed) anyone? Even going by the lore of TOS, the time between the current era and TOS was not always one of steadily growing into the light.

"no effort to explore the larger cultural impact of losing the Moon race to the Soviet Union."

That's the problem with much contrafactual historical writing - at the end of the day, it's not history. It's fiction, and fiction written to tell a very particular tale often with a very particular slant. (And traveling to a pre-determined destination.) As often happens in fiction, things inconvenient to the teller of the tale simple vanish.

"If you were a kid back then—for girls it was harder to see themselves as astronauts in that future—you probably did not understand the geopolitics."

Many adults of today have made a deliberate choice to not understand the geopolitics. (Or the economics. Or the engineering.)

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