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 adjust
ɥƃnouǝʇuɐɔı
 
Registered: 12/16/04
Posts: 8,582
Loc: Canada, LOL
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 Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons?
#8906689 - 09/10/08 12:07 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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Does it bother anyone else here that both the ESA and the NASA missions to Europa were canceled? I guess this is old news but I am still really pissed off about it.
What do you think about sending humans to the moon? Supposedly there is a "moon race" happening right now. Can someone here give me a scientific reason for doing it? Aren't unmanned drones the way to go due to lower weight and much lower cost?
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 RoosterCogburn
Fearless,one-eyed U.S.Marshall
Registered: 08/25/06
Posts: 4,625
Loc: Dirty South, NJ
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: adjust]
#8906696 - 09/10/08 12:10 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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Humans DO NOT belong in space... It's idiotic and a total waste of money. Humans need heat, food, air and worst of all, the always want to come home!
It was a publicity stunt to send a human into space, and we just keep it up... Robots FTW!
We need to explore space, and bring back samples and all that... but that's all possible without people. 
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pingpong
Registered: 09/10/08
Posts: 1
Loc: Lancaster, PA
Last seen: 1 month, 24 days
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: adjust]
#8906698 - 09/10/08 12:10 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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I can't afford gas in my car and "the man" wants to go on a Sunday drive to the moon? umm....
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RoosterCogburn
Fearless,one-eyed U.S.Marshall
Registered: 08/25/06
Posts: 4,625
Loc: Dirty South, NJ
Last seen: 5 hours, 25 minutes
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: pingpong]
#8906717 - 09/10/08 12:14 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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They don't use Exxon gasoline... 
Besides, space exploration provides more than most people think... at least it used to.  A bunch of the technology you enjoy today is from the space race.
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adjust
ɥƃnouǝʇuɐɔı
Registered: 12/16/04
Posts: 8,582
Loc: Canada, LOL
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: pingpong]
#8907939 - 09/10/08 04:16 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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Yeah well I find Jupiter's moons to be much more interesting than our own.
We can still explore both with unmanned probes... I really don't see the point in sending a man to the moon again. It just seems like a phenomenal waste of resources with no real scientific gain to justify it.
Sure there might be spin off technologies developed but the same can be said about unmanned space probes.
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RoosterCogburn
Fearless,one-eyed U.S.Marshall
Registered: 08/25/06
Posts: 4,625
Loc: Dirty South, NJ
Last seen: 5 hours, 25 minutes
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: adjust]
#8908056 - 09/10/08 04:44 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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Quote:
adjust said:
Sure there might be spin off technologies developed but the same can be said about unmanned space probes.
Absolutely. We had to do it back in the day to show how big our balls were. Now humans in space is just a waste of money, time and oddly enough... space.
We also HAD to do it by hand back then... robotics have come a loooong way, look at the Mars Rovers!
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delta9
Active Ingredient
Registered: 10/28/04
Posts: 5,238
Loc: California
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: RoosterCogburn]
#8908154 - 09/10/08 05:07 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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What about the ISS, though? I believe it is nearly complete with the recent addition of the Japanese lab module.
I agree, humans were not meant for space. This is why robotics, cybernetics, and transhumanism is the key to humanity (but by transhumanism, we won't quite be human anymore) spreading throughout the galaxies. Our life spans are too damn short and we require too many resources for it to be feasible in any other manner.
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delta9
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DieCommie
Ally
Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 7,652
Loc: The Union
Last seen: 25 minutes, 40 seconds
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: RoosterCogburn]
#8908402 - 09/10/08 06:11 PM (2 months, 23 days ago) |
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Saying humans are 'meant' for something implies some sort of grand meaning and probably a creator.
Evidence however shows we were not created we just evolved complexity using mindless process that have no meaning for us at all. There is no inherent place the universe 'means' for us to be; land, sea, air and even space is all fair game for life to expand into and develop a niche. If space exploration is an adaptation that results in better fitness, then we will do it; and we will do it by nature not by construct. If space exploration results in less fitness, then obviously it will fade out.
To expect, or even strive for, life forms to stay where 'they belong' is naive because life is constantly shifting into different niches.
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Behold yon miserable creature. That Point is a Being like ourselves, but confined to the non-dimensional Gulf. He is himself his own World, his own Universe; of any other than himself he can form no conception; he knows not Length, nor Breadth, nor Height, for he has had no experience of them; he has no cognizance even of the number Two; nor has he a thought of Plurality; for he is himself his One and All, being really Nothing. Yet mark his perfect self-contentment, and hence learn his lesson, that to be self-contented is to be vile and ignorant, and that to aspire is better than to be blindly and impotently happy.
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Chazzersize
Pokemon Master
Registered: 11/30/03
Posts: 1,262
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: DieCommie]
#8909674 - 09/10/08 10:27 PM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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perfect response, my friend.
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Take off my mask and leave the lies to the liars.
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Madtowntripper
Sun-Beams out of Cucumbers
Registered: 03/06/03
Posts: 13,981
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: RoosterCogburn]
#8910333 - 09/11/08 12:12 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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No, Robots could not do it.
We've had those two rovers on Mars for years now and they haven't acquired any geological knowledge that any undergraduate geologist couldn't gather in 10 minutes on the ground.
Seriously, all of these landers are frivolous. We have the technology now to send a group of people to Mars and safely return them. Sending even an single geologist over there for any length of time would answer literally thousands of times more information than the next 20 landers combined.
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DieCommie
Ally
Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 7,652
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: Madtowntripper]
#8910349 - 09/11/08 12:15 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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I believe you, but what specifically could a person do that a machine couldn't?
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Behold yon miserable creature. That Point is a Being like ourselves, but confined to the non-dimensional Gulf. He is himself his own World, his own Universe; of any other than himself he can form no conception; he knows not Length, nor Breadth, nor Height, for he has had no experience of them; he has no cognizance even of the number Two; nor has he a thought of Plurality; for he is himself his One and All, being really Nothing. Yet mark his perfect self-contentment, and hence learn his lesson, that to be self-contented is to be vile and ignorant, and that to aspire is better than to be blindly and impotently happy.
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Madtowntripper
Sun-Beams out of Cucumbers
Registered: 03/06/03
Posts: 13,981
Last seen: 2 hours, 12 minutes
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: DieCommie]
#8910444 - 09/11/08 12:35 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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I don't necessarily mean that there are specific tasks that you couldn't somehow design a robot to accomplish. I'd have a hard time thinking of anything in any discipline that you couldn't make a robot perform. But the general body of activities that encompass geology would be impossible for any single machine to do.
These rovers are up there with a little tool called the "RAT" for Rock Abrasion Tool. They drive this little thing to a rock and drill a little ways down into it, then get a camera really really close and attempt to to give the researchers back on Earth a good enough view to identify the rock. It's taken them three years to discover that a certain small rock feature on Mars is hematite. *3* years! You can put a rock in my hand and give me a hand lens and I'll tell if it's hematite in 10 seconds flat. The amount of effort being put into such minute discoveries is crazy.
And this recent polar lander. Billions and billions of dollars to get one shovel-full of dirt and see if it contained ice? You don't even need a geologist for this. A half-blind retard could answer this for you in seconds if you could put him on the surface.
Like I say, these are relatively minor discoveries being accomplished for billions of dollars, when comparable or slightly higher expenditures could be made to gather new knowledge that would be infinitely more valuable to man-kinds understanding of the solar system.
So much of what geologists do in the field is cerebral. Any geologist trying to gather information about an area will walk the area several times, taking samples and making copious amounts of representative sketches and diagrams before sitting down and really fleshing out how the relationships of different sequences fit together and what the likely process' are that could have brought these elements into their current positions. Trying to design a robot that could do this, or even that could relay enough information back to Earth to allow scientists there do it would be both prohibitively expensive and ultimately fool-hardy, since humans will be going to Mars sooner or later and you might as well do it now.
The latest attempt is the Mars Science Lab on which one of my past professors is a contributing worker. This will be a mobile rover with a complex suite of instruments designed to perform both geological and biological testing of the Martian environment. I don't know much about biology, but I bet you could train me to perform whatever the biology component of this mission is with relative ease.
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adjust
ɥƃnouǝʇuɐɔı
Registered: 12/16/04
Posts: 8,582
Loc: Canada, LOL
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: Madtowntripper]
#8910770 - 09/11/08 02:30 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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You forget though... any human mission needs a return trip. That, and the much higher weight of the equipment, makes it not just slightly more expensive but perhaps an order of magnitude more expensive.
And again if we are going to explore anywhere why not explore Jupiter's moons?
Quote:
We’ve spent quite a bit of time and effort trying to understand if Mars was once a habitable environment. Europa today, probably, is a habitable environment. We need to confirm this … but Europa, potentially, has all the ingredients for life … and not just four billion years ago … but today.
-Robert Pappalardo, assistant professor, University of Colorado space department
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leftysurprise
Powdered Toast Activist
Registered: 06/21/05
Posts: 11,588
Loc: Florida
Last seen: 2 hours, 27 minutes
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: DieCommie]
#8911214 - 09/11/08 07:31 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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Quote:
DieCommie said:
Saying humans are 'meant' for something implies some sort of grand meaning and probably a creator.
Evidence however shows we were not created we just evolved complexity using mindless process that have no meaning for us at all. There is no inherent place the universe 'means' for us to be; land, sea, air and even space is all fair game for life to expand into and develop a niche. If space exploration is an adaptation that results in better fitness, then we will do it; and we will do it by nature not by construct. If space exploration results in less fitness, then obviously it will fade out.
To expect, or even strive for, life forms to stay where 'they belong' is naive because life is constantly shifting into different niches.
well said.
there is no "place" for humans. sure, were most comfortable on dry land on planet earth right now, but we can go anywhere and do anything we want. humans are only limited by their current technology. whenever the planet is finally inhospitable, then where will we "belong"? we cannot survive at the highest peaks of earth mountains, nor can we survive at the bottom of the ocean, or 5+ miles under the surface of the earth, yet we go to these places every day.
we belong wherever we want to belong.
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"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it. " ~Abraham Lincoln
“If I had a quarter for every time I said I had a nickel, I would have five times as much theoretical money. ” ~Stephen Colbert
“I contend we are both atheists, I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.” ~Stephen Roberts
"George Bush says he speaks to god every day, and christians love him for it. If George Bush said he spoke to god through his hair dryer, they would think he was mad. I fail to see how the addition of a hair dryer makes it any more absurd." ~Unknown
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RoosterCogburn
Fearless,one-eyed U.S.Marshall
Registered: 08/25/06
Posts: 4,625
Loc: Dirty South, NJ
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: leftysurprise]
#8911227 - 09/11/08 07:36 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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Quote:
leftysurprise said:
we belong wherever we want to belong.
Sure, but when it raises the cost of the mission by 10 times and provides nothing more than "we put another man in space", it becomes a problem. Plus the fallout when people die... it's really dangerous!
Robots/machines can do everything much cheaper risk free, and that is becoming a priority.
Let Richard Branson send rich people into orbit... NASA only needs robots.
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leftysurprise
Powdered Toast Activist
Registered: 06/21/05
Posts: 11,588
Loc: Florida
Last seen: 2 hours, 27 minutes
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: RoosterCogburn]
#8911235 - 09/11/08 07:40 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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just because it is currently technologically difficult and risks lives doesnt mean that its not worth it. imagine if the countless people that died trying to colonize the new world hadnt, then where would we belong? over in stinky europe and asia.
i do think it is pointless to send man to the moon again, but space and other planets? never.
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"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it. " ~Abraham Lincoln
“If I had a quarter for every time I said I had a nickel, I would have five times as much theoretical money. ” ~Stephen Colbert
“I contend we are both atheists, I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.” ~Stephen Roberts
"George Bush says he speaks to god every day, and christians love him for it. If George Bush said he spoke to god through his hair dryer, they would think he was mad. I fail to see how the addition of a hair dryer makes it any more absurd." ~Unknown
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RoosterCogburn
Fearless,one-eyed U.S.Marshall
Registered: 08/25/06
Posts: 4,625
Loc: Dirty South, NJ
Last seen: 5 hours, 25 minutes
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: leftysurprise]
#8911430 - 09/11/08 09:11 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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Quote:
leftysurprise said:
i do think it is pointless to send man to the moon again, but space and other planets? never.
Eventually, sure... But at the present time, it's just too hard to sustain human life over the time needed to travel.
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DieCommie
Ally
Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 7,652
Loc: The Union
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: RoosterCogburn]
#8911437 - 09/11/08 09:13 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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Thousands of highly educated scientists and engineers think otherwise.
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Behold yon miserable creature. That Point is a Being like ourselves, but confined to the non-dimensional Gulf. He is himself his own World, his own Universe; of any other than himself he can form no conception; he knows not Length, nor Breadth, nor Height, for he has had no experience of them; he has no cognizance even of the number Two; nor has he a thought of Plurality; for he is himself his One and All, being really Nothing. Yet mark his perfect self-contentment, and hence learn his lesson, that to be self-contented is to be vile and ignorant, and that to aspire is better than to be blindly and impotently happy.
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RoosterCogburn
Fearless,one-eyed U.S.Marshall
Registered: 08/25/06
Posts: 4,625
Loc: Dirty South, NJ
Last seen: 5 hours, 25 minutes
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: DieCommie]
#8911471 - 09/11/08 09:22 AM (2 months, 22 days ago) |
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Quote:
DieCommie said:
Thousands of highly educated scientists and engineers think otherwise.
Well, they can keep wasting millions on sending warm, air breathing humans into the void of space. Makes perfect sense...
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mofo
inquisitor
Registered: 04/05/08
Posts: 785
Loc: Sol 3
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Re: Priority... explore our own moon or Jupiter's moons? [Re: RoosterCogburn]
#8915408 - 09/11/08 09:51 PM (2 months, 21 days ago) |
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We need to get cracking on this space elevator idea that gets thrown around every now and then. Once that thing is up, it'll open the floodgates. The entire solar system will be within reach. From what I've heard it all hinges on the development of carbon nanotubes, anyone know how thats going?
To answer the original question, yes I'm disappointed to hear that about the Jovian moon mission, but I'm looking forward to the mission to Ceres and that other dwarf planet/large asteroid.
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