Return to the Moon?

[Kandahar]

Moral? Why you ask? Well this country needs something other than just bad news every single day, fear of another terrorist attack, something to look forward to, a dream to look towards and spawn the imagination.

Fulfilling an abstract dream doesn't justify spending hundreds of billions of dollars on this. If we need a big idea to be optimistic about, let's focus on something that will actually help us, like energy independence.

Science, well more than simply what we can gain from after we get there, how of the science of better, safer more reliable means of getting there? I'm talking of more efficient means of rocket launches, ie maglev assisted, orbital assembly of larger space crafts. On the lunar surface then there would be the requirement of automated base assemblies, and so on, all such technology and ideas only limited to the imagination.

So now we're going to colonize the moon, instead of just returning there? That would waste even more money.

I think that most people would like to be able to make a trip even into orbit if it were possible and as safe and cheap as getting an intercontinental flight.

If that turns out to be true, then the private sector can foot the bill for manned space travel. At this point in time there is no pressing need to waste taxpayer money on this, especially when there are so many competing needs for the money.

 

[nkgupta80]

Originally Posted by jfuh
Science, well more than simply what we can gain from after we get there, how of the science of better, safer more reliable means of getting there? I'm talking of more efficient means of rocket launches, ie maglev assisted, orbital assembly of larger space crafts. On the lunar surface then there would be the requirement of automated base assemblies, and so on, all such technology and ideas only limited to the imagination.

we don't need to go to the moon to discover these technologies.

 

[Billo_Really]

Originally Posted by Atheist
The best firework show anyone has ever seen. As for a logical reason I don't know either.

I just think an Imax shot looking back at the earth would be 'the bomb'.

 

[The Mark]

I say yes.

For all of the many reasons I have read on this thread already.

 

[Thinker]

And I voted Yes...because using the moon will achieve a good portion of what we need to learn to make a Mars trip.

I can think of little that a moon trip would teach us that couldn't be learnt far
more cheaply in Earth orbit.

Lunar dust is different....

...and exists in a vacuum where its behaviour is vastly different from being in a
thin atmosphere.

Moon exploration is vastly more expensive than exploring Mars, if only because
we have to take all the fuel for the return trip. We can generate fuel for a
return trip on Mars, and do it before anyone sets of from here, saving the huge
cost of lifting it out of the Earth's gravity well.

 

[goligoth]

Have any of you heard the conspiracy theory that the U.S. never landed on the moon....I thought it was an interesting idea....

so I voted yes because then we would be able to see if we landed in the first place:mrgreen:

 

[DeeJayH]

What's your point?

cutting the space program would not result in more humanitarian aid which would be stolen by the local warlors or corrupt politicians. It would go to pork barrel spending and bridges to nowhere

and what would the world look like if our ancestors were so shortsighted
America would be full of a bunch of teepees

 

[americanwoman]

I just think an Imax shot looking back at the earth would be 'the bomb'.

We're going to have a 3-D Walking the Moon coming to our Imax here next month. I want to go see it. Those 3-D movies on the Imax are so cool.

 

[Kandahar]

cutting the space program would not result in more humanitarian aid which would be stolen by the local warlors or corrupt politicians. It would go to pork barrel spending and bridges to nowhere

The government needs to prioritize its budget. A dollar spent on the space program is one less dollar that can be spent somewhere else. Your opinion of where it would go otherwise, doesn't mean that it MUST go to pork-barrel spending.

(Besides, as far as I'm concerned a project like this IS pork-barrel spending.)

and what would the world look like if our ancestors were so shortsighted
America would be full of a bunch of teepees

Did the Babylonians try to colonize North America? Did the Romans try to set up a missile defense system? We don't have to undertake every horrendously expensive adventure that comes our way; we'd do much better to recognize our technological limitations, and wait a few decades when a project of this magnitude becomes reasonably affordable.

 

[The Mark]

The government needs to prioritize its budget. A dollar spent on the space program is one less dollar that can be spent somewhere else. Your opinion of where it would go otherwise doesn't mean that it MUST go to pork-barrel spending.

(Besides, as far as I'm concerned a project like this IS pork-barrel spending.)

IMO, the government could save much more money by getting rid of unneeded programs. (As so many have put it, "pork barrel spending")

Then it would save by lowering or cutting off completely the spending on space projects.

Did the Babylonians try to colonize North America? Did the Romans try to set up a missile defense system? We don't have to undertake every horrendously expensive adventure that comes our way; we'd do much better to recognize our technological limitations, and wait a few decades when a project of this magnitude becomes reasonably affordable.

So you would be agreeable to spending money on researching technologies that make it cheaper to travel to space?

And those technologies would have so many other uses that it would seem to me they would tie right into developing stuff for here on earth.

 

[Kandahar]

IMO, the government could save much more money by getting rid of unneeded programs. (As so many have put it, "pork barrel spending")

Then it would save by lowering or cutting off completely the spending on space projects.

Personally I don't have any problem with the space projects that give us valuable scientific research, like Cassini-Huygens or the craft that just left for Pluto. What I do have a problem with are unnecessarily expensive manned missions to places that will give us very little (if any) new knowledge that couldn't be obtained from robots doing the same thing. Sending humans to the moon or Mars is nothing but a PR stunt.

So you would be agreeable to spending money on researching technologies that make it cheaper to travel to space?

It depends on the specifics of the technologies. I'm not inherently opposed to government taking a proactive role to encourage technological development in a safe manner.

And those technologies would have so many other uses that it would seem to me they would tie right into developing stuff for here on earth.

I think most of the technologies that will eventually allow frequent manned missions to space will be developed by the private sector for earthly uses first.

 

[Kandahar]

Have any of you heard the conspiracy theory that the U.S. never landed on the moon....I thought it was an interesting idea....

so I voted yes because then we would be able to see if we landed in the first place:mrgreen:

We absolutely, positively landed on the moon. These ideas to the contrary are exactly what you described them as: conspiracy theories.

 

[Scarecrow Akhbar]

I can think of little that a moon trip would teach us that couldn't be learnt far
more cheaply in Earth orbit.


...and exists in a vacuum where its behaviour is vastly different from being in a
thin atmosphere.

Moon exploration is vastly more expensive than exploring Mars, if only because
we have to take all the fuel for the return trip. We can generate fuel for a
return trip on Mars, and do it before anyone sets of from here, saving the huge
cost of lifting it out of the Earth's gravity well.

Ummm....Nooo.

Need fuel for a return trip from the moon? Launch your fuel to your landing site first, in an unmanned lander. If it doesn't make it, launch another. Launch as much as you need. It only takes THREE DAYS to get there. The men....they only have to spend THREE DAYS en-route. Mars takes hundreds of days.

No way is a mars vacation cheaper than a moon vacation.

 

[The Mark]

Ummm....Nooo.

Need fuel for a return trip from the moon? Launch your fuel to your landing site first, in an unmanned lander. If it doesn't make it, launch another. Launch as much as you need. It only takes THREE DAYS to get there. The men....they only have to spend THREE DAYS en-route. Mars takes hundreds of days.

No way is a mars vacation cheaper than a moon vacation.

Quite.

And besides, I hear there is ice on the poles of the moon......so we could make fuel there as well. Wouldn't even need to launch fuel.

Of course, we'd have to launch the machine to convert H2O into H and O.

 

[jfuh]

Fulfilling an abstract dream doesn't justify spending hundreds of billions of dollars on this. If we need a big idea to be optimistic about, let's focus on something that will actually help us, like energy independence.

I think you'll agree that no-one would really spend such money on energy independence. As many in this forum have strong feelings for, free market will accomplish that....
But I'm not looking for justification, I'm simply stating of a reason, not looking at the economical side of it as noted in the remainder of my post.

So now we're going to colonize the moon, instead of just returning there? That would waste even more money.

The argument of my former post was for the technologies that would be required if not invented/improvised. But yes, why go back just for kicks if you are not going to do something other than simply to go. There's no more new knowledge there. As I've stated, really should expand our horizons.

If that turns out to be true, then the private sector can foot the bill for manned space travel. At this point in time there is no pressing need to waste taxpayer money on this, especially when there are so many competing needs for the money.

I agree, again I've never said of using tax payer money. I'm merely thinking of the benefits of going.

 

[jfuh]

we don't need to go to the moon to discover these technologies.

I agree, you don't have to go to the moon to discover such technologies, but going there provides much more of a push/ dream of such technologies, more of a realization.
When I'm in a lab cooking up new concepts it's always good to have a really large dream of the purpose for my work. Think big.

 

[Thinker]

Launch your fuel to your landing site first

Care to compare the cost of getting all the fuel onto the moon from Earth with
the cost of launching an almost empty return vehicle to Mars?

 

[Deegan]

As soon as we take care of the business on this planet, sure, let's go to the moon again. Right now, at this very minute, we have other problems that take precedent over any space exploration, that is quite obvious to me.

 

[jfuh]

Care to compare the cost of getting all the fuel onto the moon from Earth with
the cost of launching an almost empty return vehicle to Mars?

I think the more relevence is of the reliability of such launches. Where you nearly always have the "emergency" back up plan available for moon launches, you do not have such an option with mars.

 

[DeeJayH]

there have always been problems in the world
always have been, always will be.
to deny this is idealistic nonsense

so it is not a valid reason to not move forward with things that expand the horizon of the human race
Many advances have come to fruition due to the space program
and even more are in the pipeline or presently classified

 

[Kandahar]

there have always been problems in the world
always have been, always will be.
to deny this is idealistic nonsense

Yeah, there have always been problems, and people were content to not have a space program until 50 years ago...What's your point? Acknowledging that problems have always existed doesn't make them magically go away.

so it is not a valid reason to not move forward with things that expand the horizon of the human race

Actually it is. Your logic doesn't make any sense.

Many advances have come to fruition due to the space program
and even more are in the pipeline or presently classified

What are some of these "advances" that justify spending hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars, that couldn't have been achieved for a fraction of a cost in other ways?

 

[Deegan]

Yeah, there have always been problems, and people were content to not have a space program until 50 years ago...What's your point? Acknowledging that problems have always existed doesn't make them magically go away.



Actually it is. Your logic doesn't make any sense.



What are some of these "advances" that justify spending hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars, that couldn't have been achieved for a fraction of a cost in other ways?

Oh, I was just about to address this, I see you handled it for me.

 

[jfuh]

What are some of these "advances" that justify spending hundreds of BILLIONS of dollars, that couldn't have been achieved for a fraction of a cost in other ways?

Just to name a few of such advances would be the jumpstart of the information age.
Exotic ceramics that are in use today in many vehicles as well as perhaps one of the most important is the "moldable" magnet.
There are also many more, but such advancements would never have been realized or applied to common useage had there been no space program. Many of the technological applications today that we take for granted were patented during the space race and were directly related to space programs. Though I'll have to admit I know very little fruit bearing of the space program today with the exception of protein crystals, and various alloys that are made in zero G environments.

 

[Kandahar]

Just to name a few of such advances would be the jumpstart of the information age.
Exotic ceramics that are in use today in many vehicles as well as perhaps one of the most important is the "moldable" magnet.
There are also many more, but such advancements would never have been realized or applied to common useage had there been no space program. Many of the technological applications today that we take for granted were patented during the space race and were directly related to space programs. Though I'll have to admit I know very little fruit bearing of the space program today with the exception of protein crystals, and various alloys that are made in zero G environments.

But any of those things COULD have been achieved without the space program. If it has profitable uses on earth, someone will invent it without a space program. And if it doesn't, we shouldn't be subsidizing it. Or if we must, we can subsidize it directly without diluting the funds to other aspects of manned space travel.

(Note: When I say space program in this context, I'm mainly referring to manned exploration. I don't have any problem with government-subsidized pure research, as the information itself has a value.)

 

[kal-el]

As soon as we take care of the business on this planet, sure, let's go to the moon again. Right now, at this very minute, we have other problems that take precedent over any space exploration, that is quite obvious to me.

Yep. I say the earth takes priority over the moon. After all, it will still be there hundreds of years from now, what's the rush?