Thank you, I was despairing of finding sufficient slack for this lazy afternoon. Your efforts will not go unrewarded, young Skywalker.

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I often quote: "Man has not walked on the moon in my lifetime".

And unlike the rest of the LJ crowd, I'm 30.

It's depressing (in more than one way...)

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"Yes, you'll see curvature, but you're not seeing the whole thing"

At most you're going to see half.

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You'll never see half. You'd have to be infinitely far away.

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Since when was James Cameron allowed to make sense? Damnit.

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i look forward to the discoveries made in space travel in my lifetime ;]

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So is he suggesting that we just blast off in the void never to return? Doesn't like like much fun or much use if you can't come back with anything.

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Huh? There've been several un-manned missions, which, arguably, are just as much "exploration" as manned missions.

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And also arguably, you know, not at all.

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Now making Titanic, that was a feat.

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The problem with human space exploration is that people are very fragile. A robot will happily subside on a small nuke plant for years and collect lots of data, while humans require an immense supply-train for even short trips.

It is much, much easier to send a robot up with no need for things like "food" which take up a lot of room.

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This is true, however, speaking as someone who really digs robots (esp. robot masters) I have to say that robots are not A) clever or B) all that interesting. The point (my point, and that of the article) is that sending people to other places is just a fundamentally different exercise entirely than just knowing about other places. This drive to explore is something quintessentially human (or, at least, simian) and camcorders-with-wheels just don't scratch that itch.

You can argue the economics or efficiency of it until you're blue, but the the simple fact remains that something that makes us us doesn't believe that it's real unless we've gone there. That's what makes it count.

And, economically speaking, that's what gets it funding. Because motorized camcorders just aren't that interesting. Nobody except hardcore geeks give a shit. You send a robot, it's an appliance. You send a person, it's a hero. That's all the difference in the world.

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Since when was James Cameron allowed to snark at NASA for a damn thing? He's used piles of cash and almost three decades, just like NASA, but at least NASA can throw something into space. Cameron can't even make a decent movie.

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Oh, come on. Well first, just because you don't like his movies doesn't mean he's wrong. But besides that: I thought Titanic was mediocre, but with the exception of the clearly-to-pay-the-bills Rambo 2*, I've enjoyed everything he's written/directed.

* I have not seen "Piranha 2: The Spawning".

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Wait, did he write this before or after last week's maiden voyage of the Space Elevator Ribbon Robot? If that isn't "exploring space" enough for him, then maybe NASA should just put its foot down and stop trying. I think he's just refusing to be impressed.

Speaking of vacuums...

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I've been living in Canada too long. I can't tell if you're being sarcastic.

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Heyo. I wrote a shortshort story about something similar a while back (I'm the robodump guy, btw).

Here.

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In general, I'm a huge fan of space exploration. But I really have a problem with how NASA is spent its assloads of cash.

How many times can you send mice and chickpea seeds into orbit and still legitimately claim that you're doing "important research?" They habitually tout the goals of impressive new alloys and space-manufactured wonder drugs, but they've said that for decades. What have they honestly learned with all that fiddling around?

How many times do we have to have video teleconferences from space to kindergarten classrooms filled with kids asking over and over what it's like in space? Sure, it's great to get kids interested in exploration, but it's ultimately unimpressive to them when they realize we're not accomplishing anything up there.

NASA is squandering its resource doing basically nothing but PR to get it more budget so it can do more PR. They're chasing their tails.

And then there's this insanity with sending people to Mars. We continue to barely have the technology to send people to the moon, let alone any kind of extended mission anywhere.

We're trying to run before we can walk. We really really need to plow said assloads of cash into terrestrial research, research in materials and propulsion and all the touchy details behind making it feasible to safely get anywhere interesting.

Or, instead, we can anxiously wait for our next space video teleconference. I hear the astronaut's going to do something entertaining with eating floating food.

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You can't take my dream of eating floating spheres of chocolate milk away from me!

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Whether we have an instinctual drive to do it or not, it seems pointless to explore places we don't want to go. How about spending most of it on the Terrestrial Planet Finder until we have a short list of a dozen or so places and then work on generation starships?

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Since you linked back to this… 17,000 mph in space is not Mach 5, dammit. It’s not Mach anything.

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is he in some 1950s timewarp or something. lots of women have "seen it." hell they've built it, rocked it, commanded it. more than even this link gives credit to. so f off James.
http://womenshistory.about.com/od/aviationspace/a/timeline_space.htm

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No woman has ever been past LEO, and no man has since 1972. He's talking about the view from far enough away that you can see the whole sphere.

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I'll settle for some freeze dried ice cream and some brand new desktop images (in assorted trendy "colors") any day:



http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime-images.html

Would be cool to animate those over the past X images, kinda like the weather radar on the evening news.

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I should look more closely at the pages I link...

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mpeg/

I should mention I found this via http://pruned.blogspot.com/2006/10/hows-space-weather.html

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