Why is space so unpopular!!!

I would think that much of the appeal of the Tiger (and armor in general) is the many different conditions it can be modeled and displayed in, whether it be different degrees of battle damage or weathering, off the assembly line, full or partial interiors, in their natural element (the battlefield) enhanced with accessories, undergoing different types of maintenance, etc. Those, coupled with the number of actual makes and variants, create almost endless possiblities and guarantee a much greater possiblility of uniqueness to each build (at least that's how I see it).

Lufbery wrote:

MJH wrote: Don't worry, as soon as we have our first war in outer space it'll become sexy enough for kit manufacturers to take notice! The Tiger tank is a far less interesting subject than a space shuttle yet it would seem like every individual Tiger that ever existed has been modelled, many of them thousands of times over.... Michael    That is sadly true.

I don't know if that's "sad", although from the perspective of someone who enjoys space subjects I can certainly sympathize.

The realities are that most people are more interested in the Tiger, even though from your view points it's been done to death.  I have 3 in the stash, what can I say, I like them. 

When the kit manufacturers produce Tigers, people buy them.  They sell a lot of Tigers.  When they produce a Space Shuttle they sell only a handful compared to the Tiger. 

You can't change peoples interests.  They're interested in what they like.  It really is that simple.  The market just isn't there for space subjects as it is for tanks and aircraft.  People will complain just as much about the quantity of WWII subjects that there are out there compared to modern stuff.  Well, more people who build models are into WWII than other eras.  Kit manufacturers produce what sells, bottom line.   

MJH wrote:

Don't worry, as soon as we have our first war in outer space it'll become sexy enough for kit manufacturers to take notice! The Tiger tank is a far less interesting subject than a space shuttle yet it would seem like every individual Tiger that ever existed has been modelled, many of them thousands of times over.... Michael

 

That is sadly true. 

Don't worry, as soon as we have our first war in outer space it'll become sexy enough for kit manufacturers to take notice!

The Tiger tank is a far less interesting subject than a space shuttle yet it would seem like every individual Tiger that ever existed has been modelled, many of them thousands of times over....

Michael 

Dre wrote:

<joins the conversation a little late...> While I don't build space-related models, I have a reasonably healthy interest in what lies beyond our little blue marble.  Why people don't take an interest in space, I don't know but most of the reasons have been mentioned previously in this thread.  But when I look up on a dark, starry night I can't help but wonder...  What is out there?  Who is out there?  Is there a sentient being looking back at me across the emptiness?

 

I'd really wish more people are like you sir...

But the problem is, more people won't even bother asking that question, let alone try to answer it...

<joins the conversation a little late...>

While I don't build space-related models, I have a reasonably healthy interest in what lies beyond our little blue marble.  Why people don't take an interest in space, I don't know but most of the reasons have been mentioned previously in this thread.  But when I look up on a dark, starry night I can't help but wonder...  What is out there?  Who is out there?  Is there a sentient being looking back at me across the emptiness?

Space travel can not be sustained by its novalty value.  The fact that space travel becomes common place is inevitable, and congradulate yourselves for it having taken so long.   But if a thing is really of more value than it costs, then its being common place would never stand in the way of it being done again, and again, and ever better.    Is car, train and airplane travel not common place?  Yet because it offers real value that exceeds its cost, it is done again and again, and ever better despite its banality.   Does public care if they fly  in a 757 or a 787?  On the whole, no.  But because  flying is a proposition that offers returns above its cost; what is more is it does this not just for the public as a whole, but for those who actually shoulder's direct cost; incentives abound for  continuous upgrade in capability, and in technology.

If discovering Martian life offers the realistic prospect of allows a new drug to be developed for people on earth, and that drug can realistically be expected to generate revenue to cover the flights to mars plus a necessary premium to cover the risks involved, rest assured the banality of space flight will in no way prevent a flood of finance from pouring into such a venture. 

The truth is with current technology, the cost of space flight does not make many possible returns from space flight seem worthwhile.   What is more is people who sits down and actually does the calculation and actually has to answer for the money do not, on the whole, believe that at this time, there is good enough prospect of revolutaionary new technology to facilitate space flight such that focused investment in that direction is worth it.

 

Persephones_Dream wrote:

Now here I have to say I agree with you.  The problem - if you will - about spaceflight is that it has become so commonplace, so ordinary (even though it really isn't) in the mind of the average American that it rarely even gets any news coverage these days.  If it had not been for Challenger and Columbia, we probably wouldn't even know when the Space Shuttle was being launched or in orbit.  Of course, those of us that work in the space field know these things but the average Joe on the street hasn't a clue and, for the most part, could care less these days. Our dream might have been to get to the Moon, which we did in July of 1969.  What we either forgot or overlooked was what to do once we got there.  Unfortunately, the only real purpose to landing on the Moon back in 1969 was to say we beat the Russians there.  While there was a ton of scientific revolutions behind that trip, they were out of sight and out of mind as they were not the purpose of the journey.  In many senses, this has turned out to be a hollow victory. Over the past nearly 30 years, I have worked many a public star party and given tours at the observatories I work at.  One thing that is extremely noticeable is the serious decline in interest in the sciences.  There is little other than the occasional "wow" factor that drives people to star parties today.  One of the more interesting changes I've seen is a serious shift of interest in space and science from the boys to the girls.  It used to be completely the opposite. Interesting. But, in any case, I suspect there are only about two things that will recapture the public's attention on space flight - a trip to the nearest star or running into an intelligent alien lifeform.  A human landing on Mars might draw some attention for a while, but I doubt it'll hold the public's fascination for very long.  Again, how very unfortunate! -Rowen

 

I surely agree on that one sir...

But I also have a theory on why this subject is unpopular for most people...

"Entertainment Value"

Well, its my observation that most of society is more "entertainment inclined", meaning they only get interested in such things or activities that will not bore them, but rather entertain them. Things like barhopping, gossiping about celebrities, concerts, parties (of all kinds). And things like studying and the like are what many (but not all) will say, not fun...

people will not care more about where their creature comforts came from as long as it provides fun for them. Take note of cellular phones for example. Each year - slash that - almost each month we see a new model of a certain cellphone brand, and people will cash out for this new model and dump their old one because its not popular anymore, even though its still very useful for many tasks they require to do...

Space is a sure victim of this. You guys surely remember Burt Rutan's Tier One Program when it succeeded in winning the X-Prize in 2004. People in the hundreds of thousands flocked to Mojave Air/Spaceport during its 3 spaceflights, and millions more watching on TV. But after a few weeks, not much talk of it has ever been presented anymore... Heck, I can't even find a copy of Discovery Channel's documentary about that program here... (that just sucks)

Space is only interesting when it is featured in movies...

And even a space-related film with a blockbuster cast and an action-packed story and VFX will be more popular that the other with a more human side for a story...

Take note of Deep Impact and Armageddon - Deep Impact has a much more realistic - and more human - storyline and concepts (apart for the nuclear powered Messiah, but still possible), plus the effects are in par to what we saw in Ron Howard's rendition of Apollo 13, and yet Armageddon - with its unrealistic plot, mushy scenes, explosions everywhere etc. etc. proved to be more popular than the latter...

Don't get me wrong, I liked both films because it introduced to the world that a cosmic threat like that does exist. But you can see in these two films which is more popular, which goes to Armageddon, because it has more entertaiment value that Deep Impact...

But unfortunately, for many of society's members, space is just a nice to know item, only talked about in some boring class lesson...

In our place, dreaming of being an astronaut is practically just plain stupid, and the stuff of laughs, and for many people it is only a dream for someone who wants fame and fortune (like, coutless TV ads, awards and recognitions, and political popularity, just like what happened to our boxing sensation - Manny Pacquiao)

And for me, its really sad...

Agamemnon wrote:

To get back to the matter at hand, I'd guess the reason space modelling has taken a dive hasn't got much to do with idealists like myself, and rather more to do with the nature of space exploration today. Almost everything NASA shoots up into the sky are unmanned robots. Not cool spaceships, not even rockets. Drones, probes, capsules.... equipment. To Joe Sixpack, modelling a Mars lander probably sounds as exciting as a 1:18 scale concrete mixer. It is quite possible that we'll see some kind of resurgence of interest eventually, quite probably following the success of the private sector at launching their own orbital spacecraft. We might even see the much-talked-about advent of lunar mining. It won't be big and amazing, meaning-of-life stuff, just a bunch of drones scraping up rare materials and shipping them back home so we can make some new ceramic armor plates, fusion reactors, artificial whoopla thingamajigs and so on.

Now here I have to say I agree with you.  The problem - if you will - about spaceflight is that it has become so commonplace, so ordinary (even though it really isn't) in the mind of the average American that it rarely even gets any news coverage these days.  If it had not been for Challenger and Columbia, we probably wouldn't even know when the Space Shuttle was being launched or in orbit.  Of course, those of us that work in the space field know these things but the average Joe on the street hasn't a clue and, for the most part, could care less these days.

Our dream might have been to get to the Moon, which we did in July of 1969.  What we either forgot or overlooked was what to do once we got there.  Unfortunately, the only real purpose to landing on the Moon back in 1969 was to say we beat the Russians there.  While there was a ton of scientific revolutions behind that trip, they were out of sight and out of mind as they were not the purpose of the journey.  In many senses, this has turned out to be a hollow victory.

Over the past nearly 30 years, I have worked many a public star party and given tours at the observatories I work at.  One thing that is extremely noticeable is the serious decline in interest in the sciences.  There is little other than the occasional "wow" factor that drives people to star parties today.  One of the more interesting changes I've seen is a serious shift of interest in space and science from the boys to the girls.  It used to be completely the opposite. Interesting.

But, in any case, I suspect there are only about two things that will recapture the public's attention on space flight - a trip to the nearest star or running into an intelligent alien lifeform.  A human landing on Mars might draw some attention for a while, but I doubt it'll hold the public's fascination for very long.  Again, how very unfortunate!

-Rowen

I am, indeed, a card-carrying Bleaker.

It is true that we are made of the stuff that's floating around in the wild black yonder. It doesn't necessarily mean we can go back there. Indeed, our current evolutionary state is such as it is precisely because we evolved upon a planet. A kind of creature at home in space would be a wildly different kind of beast indeed. If we were to run across such a creature on our voyager through the umbral gulf that separates the vast distances of existence, we might not even recognize it as a creature at all.

To get back to the matter at hand, I'd guess the reason space modelling has taken a dive hasn't got much to do with idealists like myself, and rather more to do with the nature of space exploration today. Almost everything NASA shoots up into the sky are unmanned robots. Not cool spaceships, not even rockets. Drones, probes, capsules.... equipment. To Joe Sixpack, modelling a Mars lander probably sounds as exciting as a 1:18 scale concrete mixer.

It is quite possible that we'll see some kind of resurgence of interest eventually, quite probably following the success of the private sector at launching their own orbital spacecraft. We might even see the much-talked-about advent of lunar mining. It won't be big and amazing, meaning-of-life stuff, just a bunch of drones scraping up rare materials and shipping them back home so we can make some new ceramic armor plates, fusion reactors, artificial whoopla thingamajigs and so on.

I don't think we can go back to the spirit of 1969 anytime soon, however. We know so much more about space than we did then, which has tempered those early feelings of optimism. I do expect my point of view will be proved wrong eventually, since almost everyone's beliefs about almost everything will eventually be thus nullified by the progress of time and understanding. But here and now, I am al--

Agamemnon wrote:

Space is despair. Despair that Mankind is doomed to this one ball of earth, until the day the Sun finally flares into a red giant, sweeping into nothingness all we've ever accomplished, all that's ever been done, ever been said, ever been seen. And there will be nobody left to shed a tear. For me, space is the symbol that in the end, nothing matters, but that here and now, we are alive. Going there serves no purpose, however. You can outrun destiny or deny fate, but you cannot ignore the nature of the universe.

 

The sun will not flare into a red giant for another 6 billion years, brother.    I think there is an concept of order of magnitude that is eluding you.   The assumption that we know all the laws of physics and other sciences well enough to devine that nothing will likely happen in the next 6,000,000,000 years to liberate menkind from the confines of this planet is really the only assumption I can think of that is actually orders of magnitude more silly than the other assumption I tried to deflate earlier - that ability to achieve interstellar travel is right around the corner with just a few short decades of determined investment.

If humans, or our technical descendants, were to survive 6,000,000,000 years, then I think we can be as certain as we can be of anything that we will get off this planet. 

 

Agamemnon wrote:

There's literally nothing on the moon except dust and rocks. The same is true for Mars, the possibility of ancient microbes notwithstanding. Now, I might suffer from an idealism deficit, but I see no value in exploring those. As for the beyond... Well, that's where we come to a problem, which is the nature of our physics. We can't engage the warp drive and whizz off into the wild blue yonder. Nor can we dive into a black hole to emerge on the other end of a wormhole. Real physics can't be ignored like that, by narrative causality or otherwise. A lot of very complex physics rotates around the topic, using phrases like the "chronology protection conjecture" or "closed timelike curve". Perhaps their research will prove that the universe is queerer than all of us can suppose. Personally, I doubt it, doubly so for my own lifetime. When I look at the night sky, I don't see possibilities. I certainly don't see the future of Mankind. What I see is an oppressive, gargantuan expanse of nothing, stretching from here to infinity, and ourselves in the middle of it, on what might very well be the only speck of life in all of its infinite vastness (and even if it weren't, it might as well be, thanks to the distances involved). Space is dead. It's not like the ocean, which is just as hostile to our fragile shells, yet full of amazing, fantastic life. Space is the antithesis of life, a wasteland of nothingness so colossal that travelling from one star to another over the vast tracts of night would take a thousand lifetimes. Space is despair. Despair that Mankind is doomed to this one ball of earth, until the day the Sun finally flares into a red giant, sweeping into nothingness all we've ever accomplished, all that's ever been done, ever been said, ever been seen. And there will be nobody left to shed a tear. For me, space is the symbol that in the end, nothing matters, but that here and now, we are alive. Going there serves no purpose, however. You can outrun destiny or deny fate, but you cannot ignore the nature of the universe.

Wow.  This kind of view of space amazes me.  I am not sure if I should laugh, cry or be angry about it. But, as an astrophysicist in real life, I find it disturbing on many levels.

The moon is nothing but dust and rock?!?  Do you have ANY idea of what that dust and rock contains?  Alumimum. Silicon. Iron. Magnesium. Calcium. Helium-3 (something that will be EXTREMELY important once we develop fusion power).  Oxygen (the moon is more oxygen than anything). Hydrogen. Some of the lunar basalts (rocks) are extremely rich in Titanium. Etc.  It is a veritable storehouse of natural resources beyond the scale of anything we have on Earth.  The farside of the moon offers research possibilities for deep space beyond anything on Earth too, with it's radio-shadow and nearly 14 days of continous complete night.  With 1/6th the gravity and an escape velocity of about 2.4km/s (as opposed to the 11.2km/s of Earth), launching manmade materials into space for various destinations is exponentially cheaper than pushing it up from Earth surface.

Space is dead?  Pray tell!!!  Where do you think the amino acids that form your RNA and DNA chains come from???  Molecular clouds, comets, interplanetary dust particles...all contain some degree of the basic building blocks of life. Without this *stuff* in space, we wouldn't exist.  This is true locally as well as broadly throughout the galaxy (and other galaxies as well).  Space is not the antithesis of life, it is the reason it exists!

When I look into the night sky (which I am wont to do on a very frequent basis), I see everything that is, everything that was, and everything that can be!  It is beautiful beyond compare, so immense it is beyond comprehension and it calls to me as a curious mind to come and find its secrets. They are there, waiting for us to unravel their clues and use them, as once we did with simple minerals on Earth that now are processed and formed into our behemoths of engineering marvels or the simple tools we use to eat our food with. 

We came from space and we shall return to space.  It is our birthplace as well as our grave. 

Those ancient microbes on Mars....they might just be our very distant ancestors.  There are tantalizing clues and interesting bits of evidence that suggest the possibility of trans-planetary life.  For a taste of that, check out the evidences and debates of the meteorite known as "ALH-84001".

Space is despair?  No. Space is the Ultimate Challenge of mankind!  You are right that when the day comes that the Sun consumes itself and destroys Earth that all we were will be erased from the Universe - unless our distant descendants move to a new world.  Doing so is not only possible it is doable now.  We may not have warp drives - yet - but we have the technology to travel between the stars, albeit very slowly (at this time).

And going there serves no purpose?  It most certainly does!  It serves the purpose of satiating our inherit curiosity and sense of adventure; to build, to touch, to explore and to learn about. 

Beyond that, our being in space has many practical applications as well.  Let's face it, if the dinosaurs had a space program, we might not be talking right now.......

-Rowen

 

Why journey beyond the horizon? You will just fall off the edge of the Earth when you get there!

Geez, those Wright Brothers were such morons. Wasting all that time and money when everybody knew man can never ever fly!

c3po wrote:

Auntie Matter wrote:  Agamemnon wrote:   There's literally nothing on the moon except dust and rocks. The same is true for Mars, the possibility of ancient microbes notwithstanding. Now, I might suffer from an idealism deficit, but I see no value in exploring those. As for the beyond... Well, that's where we come to a problem, which is the nature of our physics. We can't engage the warp drive and whizz off into the wild blue yonder. Nor can we dive into a black hole to emerge on the other end of a wormhole. Real physics can't be ignored like that, by narrative causality or otherwise. A lot of very complex physics rotates around the topic, using phrases like the "chronology protection conjecture" or "closed timelike curve". Perhaps their research will prove that the universe is queerer than all of us can suppose. Personally, I doubt it, doubly so for my own lifetime. When I look at the night sky, I don't see possibilities. I certainly don't see the future of Mankind. What I see is an oppressive, gargantuan expanse of nothing, stretching from here to infinity, and ourselves in the middle of it, on what might very well be the only speck of life in all of its infinite vastness (and even if it weren't, it might as well be, thanks to the distances involved). Space is dead. It's not like the ocean, which is just as hostile to our fragile shells, yet full of amazing, fantastic life. Space is the antithesis of life, a wasteland of nothingness so colossal that travelling from one star to another over the vast tracts of night would take a thousand lifetimes. Space is despair. Despair that Mankind is doomed to this one ball of earth, until the day the Sun finally flares into a red giant, sweeping into nothingness all we've ever accomplished, all that's ever been done, ever been said, ever been seen. And there will be nobody left to shed a tear. For me, space is the symbol that in the end, nothing matters, but that here and now, we are alive. Going there serves no purpose, however. You can outrun destiny or deny fate, but you cannot ignore the nature of the universe.   Bertrand Russell "all the labor of the ages.."   Ag you are 1000% on the same page as I am. Righton,brother...or sister I feel so sorry for both of you. You live a life devoid of any hope, without any magic of discovery, lost in perpetual bleakness. You see only one blade of grass in a field of green. I hope one day that you will widen your vision, and see the entire painting before you.

 

well said sir...

 

to auntie matter and Agamemnon

No offensement but...

these kinds of people are the ones who are going to be extinct...

having a closed mind is a sure way to die folks (I nearly lost my life with that attitude once)...

oh well... I think we had enough convincing these two people...

they have no hope of improving their points of view...

Auntie Matter wrote:

Agamemnon wrote: There's literally nothing on the moon except dust and rocks. The same is true for Mars, the possibility of ancient microbes notwithstanding. Now, I might suffer from an idealism deficit, but I see no value in exploring those. As for the beyond... Well, that's where we come to a problem, which is the nature of our physics. We can't engage the warp drive and whizz off into the wild blue yonder. Nor can we dive into a black hole to emerge on the other end of a wormhole. Real physics can't be ignored like that, by narrative causality or otherwise. A lot of very complex physics rotates around the topic, using phrases like the "chronology protection conjecture" or "closed timelike curve". Perhaps their research will prove that the universe is queerer than all of us can suppose. Personally, I doubt it, doubly so for my own lifetime. When I look at the night sky, I don't see possibilities. I certainly don't see the future of Mankind. What I see is an oppressive, gargantuan expanse of nothing, stretching from here to infinity, and ourselves in the middle of it, on what might very well be the only speck of life in all of its infinite vastness (and even if it weren't, it might as well be, thanks to the distances involved). Space is dead. It's not like the ocean, which is just as hostile to our fragile shells, yet full of amazing, fantastic life. Space is the antithesis of life, a wasteland of nothingness so colossal that travelling from one star to another over the vast tracts of night would take a thousand lifetimes. Space is despair. Despair that Mankind is doomed to this one ball of earth, until the day the Sun finally flares into a red giant, sweeping into nothingness all we've ever accomplished, all that's ever been done, ever been said, ever been seen. And there will be nobody left to shed a tear. For me, space is the symbol that in the end, nothing matters, but that here and now, we are alive. Going there serves no purpose, however. You can outrun destiny or deny fate, but you cannot ignore the nature of the universe.   Bertrand Russell "all the labor of the ages.."   Ag you are 1000% on the same page as I am. Righton,brother...or sister

I feel so sorry for both of you.

You live a life devoid of any hope, without any magic of discovery, lost in perpetual bleakness.

You see only one blade of grass in a field of green. I hope one day that you will widen your vision, and see the entire painting before you.

Why post in this thread if you don't like space?

"I can sight thousands of examples". sorry I have no social skills  to be sure....because its "cite" not "sight" and a "thousand" examples is an exaggeration. 

Agamemnon wrote:

Bgrigg wrote: We have the capability of reaching Mars, but we only send probes. We have the technology to build a base on the moon, but we have not. There's literally nothing on the moon except dust and rocks. The same is true for Mars, the possibility of ancient microbes notwithstanding. Now, I might suffer from an idealism deficit, but I see no value in exploring those. As for the beyond... Well, that's where we come to a problem, which is the nature of our physics. We can't engage the warp drive and whizz off into the wild blue yonder. Nor can we dive into a black hole to emerge on the other end of a wormhole. Real physics can't be ignored like that, by narrative causality or otherwise. A lot of very complex physics rotates around the topic, using phrases like the "chronology protection conjecture" or "closed timelike curve". Perhaps their research will prove that the universe is queerer than all of us can suppose. Personally, I doubt it, doubly so for my own lifetime. When I look at the night sky, I don't see possibilities. I certainly don't see the future of Mankind. What I see is an oppressive, gargantuan expanse of nothing, stretching from here to infinity, and ourselves in the middle of it, on what might very well be the only speck of life in all of its infinite vastness (and even if it weren't, it might as well be, thanks to the distances involved). Space is dead. It's not like the ocean, which is just as hostile to our fragile shells, yet full of amazing, fantastic life. Space is the antithesis of life, a wasteland of nothingness so colossal that travelling from one star to another over the vast tracts of night would take a thousand lifetimes. Space is despair. Despair that Mankind is doomed to this one ball of earth, until the day the Sun finally flares into a red giant, sweeping into nothingness all we've ever accomplished, all that's ever been done, ever been said, ever been seen. And there will be nobody left to shed a tear. For me, space is the symbol that in the end, nothing matters, but that here and now, we are alive. Going there serves no purpose, however. You can outrun destiny or deny fate, but you cannot ignore the nature of the universe.

  Bertrand Russell "all the labor of the ages.."   Ag you are 1000% on the same page as I am. Righton,brother...or sister

Agamemnon wrote:

Bgrigg wrote: We have the capability of reaching Mars, but we only send probes. We have the technology to build a base on the moon, but we have not. There's literally nothing on the moon except dust and rocks. The same is true for Mars, the possibility of ancient microbes notwithstanding. Now, I might suffer from an idealism deficit, but I see no value in exploring those.

 

Who said explore? I said MINE THEM. Put dangerous and polluting manufacturing on them. Stop raping and pillaging our own planet and start using ones that aren't being used by anybody.

I'm afraid I can't share your despair about space. Since we know next to nothing about it, how can you state it's dead? At one time "leading experts" agreed that Columbus would sail off the edge of the world to his (and his crew's) doom, since there was nothing there, not even dust and rocks. Instead he found life, rich and vibrant life.

Bgrigg wrote:

We have the capability of reaching Mars, but we only send probes. We have the technology to build a base on the moon, but we have not.

There's literally nothing on the moon except dust and rocks. The same is true for Mars, the possibility of ancient microbes notwithstanding. Now, I might suffer from an idealism deficit, but I see no value in exploring those.

As for the beyond... Well, that's where we come to a problem, which is the nature of our physics. We can't engage the warp drive and whizz off into the wild blue yonder. Nor can we dive into a black hole to emerge on the other end of a wormhole. Real physics can't be ignored like that, by narrative causality or otherwise. A lot of very complex physics rotates around the topic, using phrases like the "chronology protection conjecture" or "closed timelike curve". Perhaps their research will prove that the universe is queerer than all of us can suppose. Personally, I doubt it, doubly so for my own lifetime.

When I look at the night sky, I don't see possibilities. I certainly don't see the future of Mankind. What I see is an oppressive, gargantuan expanse of nothing, stretching from here to infinity, and ourselves in the middle of it, on what might very well be the only speck of life in all of its infinite vastness (and even if it weren't, it might as well be, thanks to the distances involved).

Space is dead. It's not like the ocean, which is just as hostile to our fragile shells, yet full of amazing, fantastic life. Space is the antithesis of life, a wasteland of nothingness so colossal that travelling from one star to another over the vast tracts of night would take a thousand lifetimes.

Space is despair. Despair that Mankind is doomed to this one ball of earth, until the day the Sun finally flares into a red giant, sweeping into nothingness all we've ever accomplished, all that's ever been done, ever been said, ever been seen. And there will be nobody left to shed a tear. For me, space is the symbol that in the end, nothing matters, but that here and now, we are alive. Going there serves no purpose, however. You can outrun destiny or deny fate, but you cannot ignore the nature of the universe.

But the point is that they were striving to meet that goal. Today we are not. We have the capability of reaching Mars, but we only send probes. We have the technology to build a base on the moon, but we have not. We rely on the Russians for a space station, and I fear that the official language of the moon will me Mandarin or Cantonese. We lost the space race, not because we didn't have the technology, but because we didn't have the will. The Saturn V is a memorial, and the shuttle is thirty years old. NASA's budget (as bloated as it is) is less than American women spend on makeup per year.

I will say it again (for the third time this thread). I remember the first man in space. I never thought I would see the last.

Bill

I have to admit I'm giving Sci-Fi a second look.  One of our clubmembers brought in a very nice Romulan Warbird that was just gorgeous!  Makes me want to build one! 

Hans Christian M. Ben wrote:

And now physicists are more and more considering the possibilities of previously fictional concepts like worm holes and warp drives etc.

 

Thoughts of going to the moon using rocket power had crossed some people's mind during the 1400s.   But it took a broad fronted elevation of all fields of science, chemistry, biology, physics, mathematic, optics, engineering, etc, etc over 500 years to bring it into reality.   Almost all of the innumerable critical advances in these fields that were required to eventually bring about space travel were brought about for totally unrelated reasons.   Only when these things fortuitiously clicked into place did the possibility of space travel become real.    If you were a wise and rational futurist during the 1400s, you too might be excited about this new fangled notion of going to the moon by rocket.  Afterall, rocket is such a new and excited innovation.   But if you had control of reserach allocation, could you have reasonably foretold which fields you should specifically pour your money, and in what projects, in order to bring about actual rocket based space travel any sooner?  You probably could not.   Indeed, if you were a futurist of 1400s, and you did not have the benefit of hindsight from 600 years into the future, would you have even recognized that rocketry was indeed the key to space travel?   If a contempoary of yours had written about a giant kite that will bring man to the moon, knowing what you could in 1400s, would you not have been more excited about advancements in kite technology than the dirty, dangerous, and very crude rocketry thing?

 

 

but until that time comes, space would only be popular in science-fiction films and stories...

grandadjohn wrote:

How much that was science fiction when Star Trek first came out is today science fact.

I have to admit, I'm no Star Trek or Star Wars fan (I didn't like their stories much), but what fascinates me is that, slowly, many of the concepts introduced in those films are now coming into being...

And now physicists are more and more considering the possibilities of previously fictional concepts like worm holes and warp drives etc.

I believe that mankind will develop these radical forms of technology in the future, its just the question of when...

How much that was science fiction when Star Trek first came out is today science fact.

gulfstreamV wrote:

Bgrigg wrote:  It is the absence of innerspace capability which has me bothered. This ability was close at hand in the late 60s, and was lost in the bureaucracy of NASA. Mmnn, NASA/USA achievments have been incredible. Milestones have been reached. Technology has been advanced and shared with mindblowing results. The USA taxpayers have been shown their "Bang for a Buck", Results! in the 60's and beyond. Yet human loss is always a tradgedy that is hard to overcome.The hardest part of that is NASA had to achieve a goal that dealt, and deals with untested technology in aircraft/spaceship design,extreame loads and enviromental demands, return to earth capibilities and creature comforts. I think those gains were rapidly produced. Yet we have discovered that repeated "round trip" travel in any means, with a production level airframe(even com. air & auto) has it's limits. The sad thing that comes to my mind and has an arguement towards the robot idea is, and Golf and its tech has come up in this thread.... is Golfer Pawyne Stewart, He was flying back or to a tournament in his Learjet(owned,leased or) the jet lost cabin preasure @ +-35,000agl and all aboard died in a matter of seconds....seconds....00.08 sec. The plane continued on coarse NW into Wyo. Autopilot engaged the plane flew at level and speed with soles on board. The Air force scrambled F-16's to intercept, what at that time was a aircraft in distress with unknown Mayday call. Close inflight recon determined the cabin preas. failure.The A.F. command then had to decide weather or not to shoot it down to avoid furthur threat to human life if it crashed into a populatted area. Long story short.. that is what can go wrong in what we consider a safe use everyday airplane. My hat is off to the men and women that design,build and fly the rigs there puttin' into Space. NASA/USA  JPL and all the companys involved in the future of our quest into space.

Yes. Travelling and exploration has its inherent risks, whether it is driving to work, flying to a vacation spot, crossing the Atlantic, flying to space, and many others.

But over the years, mankind have worked so hard to the point that these risks were minimized to the point that it is almost 100% safe (well almost).

In everything we do, there are risks, no matter how significant, or insignificant these risks are, which when they appear, can set fear to those who witnessed it, and experienced it.

But mankind have shown that through creativeness, hard work, and perseverance, we can rise from those accidents and disasters and find ways to prevent them, and in some cases, eliminate them (but not completely).

I think the same can also apply to human spaceflight. True we've lost dozens of lives, but through those tragedies, the people involved with the space program have taken into account those events and turned it into learning experiences from which they can improve existing systems and hardware to make them even safer for people to ride again.

Human Spaceflight is still in its infancy. And like our earthbound transportation systems during their early years, and today, will still witness countless trials and errors, from which, loss of life is expected.

Robots and similar hardware have been very useful to us, and their worth is getting greater with each passing year. But I believe its very wrong to say that robots should do all the work.

Yes, robots are handy at many tasks that requires the precision and resistance that no human could ever match. But I believe its very much wrong to assume that robots are the only ones who should do those things.

To Auntie Matter;I believe that your opinion is influenced by your thought that we have enough lives to lose with this endeavor, and that you believe that human spaceflight was just created for the purpose of just getting into space, and for national pride, and for the sake of human curiosity... but the thing is, Human spaceflight is not concerned with just that.

You also said that there's too much star trek mentality here, but you know what, its that same mentality (I'm not literal about star trek here) that gave us the capability, and the convenience that we enjoy today.

I think, and I believe many also think that the space program is not just for that, but rather to improve our lives on Earth, and to find ways to improve it further, and to preserve it when the time comes when earthly life is mortally threatened.

Lets face it, our earth will die in the future, and many people don't want life to just be gone with a bang (or by other means), and, as I'm a Catholic (actually any religion will say this), it is our holy duty to save lives, big and small. So we have to continue what were doing right now. And I think that's also on the minds of the people who sacrificed themselves for their work, because they believe in what mankind can do, what we can do.

For me, God IS the greatest modeler. And as a scale modeler, I know what it feels like when my creations get destroyed. (I know, I've cried many times over them)

So it is up to us to save his creations.

So for me, human spaceflight is an indispensable program for us. And whether we like it or not, we are going to leave earth and practically, the entire solar system, no matter how dangerous it is, in order to survive. 

And if were going to just let robots alone to do all the work for us, then its only a matter of time before mankind; and all life on Earth from which our Lord has painstakingly created, will be extinct in the vast darkness of space...

In the end I leave you this phrase:

"Learning is not just "seeing" it, but, more importantly, "feeling" it"

 

"Is the risk worth it? I think so..."

- Dr. Peter H. Diamandis - President: X-Prize foundation

Bgrigg wrote:

It is the absence of innerspace capability which has me bothered. This ability was close at hand in the late 60s, and was lost in the bureaucracy of NASA.

Mmnn, NASA/USA achievments have been incredible. Milestones have been reached. Technology has been advanced and shared with mindblowing results. The USA taxpayers have been shown their "Bang for a Buck", Results! in the 60's and beyond. Yet human loss is always a tradgedy that is hard to overcome.The hardest part of that is NASA had to achieve a goal that dealt, and deals with untested technology in aircraft/spaceship design,extreame loads and enviromental demands, return to earth capibilities and creature comforts. I think those gains were rapidly produced. Yet we have discovered that repeated "round trip" travel in any means, with a production level airframe(even com. air & auto) has it's limits. The sad thing that comes to my mind and has an arguement towards the robot idea is, and Golf and its tech has come up in this thread.... is Golfer Pawyne Stewart, He was flying back or to a tournament in his Learjet(owned,leased or) the jet lost cabin preasure @ +-35,000agl and all aboard died in a matter of seconds....seconds....00.08 sec. The plane continued on coarse NW into Wyo. Autopilot engaged the plane flew at level and speed with soles on board. The Air force scrambled F-16's to intercept, what at that time was a aircraft in distress with unknown Mayday call. Close inflight recon determined the cabin preas. failure.The A.F. command then had to decide weather or not to shoot it down to avoid furthur threat to human life if it crashed into a populatted area. Long story short.. that is what can go wrong in what we consider a safe use everyday airplane. My hat is off to the men and women that design,build and fly the rigs there puttin' into Space. NASA/USA  JPL and all the companys involved in the future of our quest into space.

The value of intersteller space travel is so far into our future that 500 or 1000 years is a moot difference. On the other hand, innerspace travel has immediate benefits. The ability to place dangerous manufacturing into near Earth orbit, or even on the far side of the moon, is obvious. The potential of nearly limitless power generation through the building of very large solar arrays, and by the mining and manufacturing of hydrogen is boundless, and is what I believe to be the very thing that has any chance of saving our planet. The benefits of mining the asteroid belt, rather than mining deeper and deeper into our planet's crust, should not be ignored.

I quite agree that opening a travel agency for trips to Betegeuse or Alpha Centauri is a poor business plan. It is the absence of innerspace capability which has me bothered. This ability was close at hand in the late 60s, and was lost in the bureaucracy of NASA.

Seeing the value of space travel would make no quantum difference for this generation or the next.    10 time more expenditure in space travel or 10 times more capablility to undertake space travel would not make any order of magnitude difference in our ability to increase our reach into space in my lifetime or perhaps my grand children's lifetime.   It is not the absence of technological or engineering investment that keeps us rooted on the earth.   It is the fact that our civilization's basic science foundation still falls far short on all fronts such that, at this time, I don't give us good odds of guessing correctly exactly how we should allocate our basic sicence investment in order to bring interstellar travel nearer than it would arrive naturally.

Don't get me wrong, I am all for maximum investment in all fronts of basic science so we can elevate the broad platform that forms the basis of any space venture.   But I see the difference is between achieving interstellar travel in 500 rather than 1000 years, not 20 rather than 50, or 100 rather than 200 years.   Captain Kirk will not arrive in the 23rd century.   

Discovery of life on Mars would be an infinitely fascintating side show.  It might advance our state of biological sciences.   It might prompt faster incremental technological improvement in our space exploration technology.   But it can not bridge of orders of magnitude gap needed to popularize interplentary travel to the status of the routine, and its effects would certainly will be but a blip next to what it takes to bridge the yawning, comprehensive technological gap that stands between us and interstellar travel on a board front.