Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Saxman on October 22, 2009, 03:25:46 PM
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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33435155/ns/technology_and_science-space
An independent commission is recommending that NASA skip a return to the moon, and aim directly for either an asteroid nearby or one of the Martian moons. Among the reasons cited is the expense of sending a rocket into space with the amount of fuel necessary to complete the trip.
My own thought is:
Why are we still so attached to earth-launched vehicles? If we expect to expand our space program beyond Earth orbit, it's damn time we developed a self-propelled manned space craft that remains permanently in orbit.
If such a vessel were docked at the ISS when not on a mission I'd imagine it would substantially reduce the fuel requirements since you don't need to worry about escaping earth's atmosphere. That means more fuel that can be devoted to the mission. Also, IIRC, the majority of the fuel needed by the Apollo missions was, once again, to escape EARTH'S atmosphere. The rocket on the lunar modules didn't need anything near the same amount of power to jet back up to the command module after the surface mission was completed. You could then use "away modules" to jet down to the moon while the main ship remains in orbit in a similar fashion.
Different components could be assembles and tested on earth, then sent into space for assembly in a similar manner as the ISS.
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I'm still waiting for the mothership to pick us up... :angel:
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Although, assembly on Earth and launching uses 1 qty of fuel. Assembly in space requires multiple launches using multiples of the same qty of fuel. The only savings would come into play after the "orbiting spacecraft" completes it's Nth mission where N = the number of trips the shuttle took to assemble it. And by then the craft would be obsolete and the whole process would have to start over again.
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Get to the moon again so we know that we can still do it. Then make the mission to Mars.
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Although, assembly on Earth and launching uses 1 qty of fuel. Assembly in space requires multiple launches using multiples of the same qty of fuel. The only savings would come into play after the "orbiting spacecraft" completes it's Nth mission where N = the number of trips the shuttle took to assemble it. And by then the craft would be obsolete and the whole process would have to start over again.
Dragon,
Keep in mind propulsion models like electrodynamic drives that have high specific impulse but low thrust-to-weight ratios become much more feasible once you no longer have to worry about escaping atmosphere (highly efficient drives like electrodynamic/static don't have the thrust to escape atmosphere). The capability of greater fuel efficiency under these propulsion models would at least appear to lead to a quicker return on the investment than if conventional chemical rockets were used.
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Deep Space One is a space probe that was sent in space a few years back. I believe it was the first man-made probe to use the Ion Drive. It collects solar energy from the sun and stars and converts it to usable energy. The energy can then be used to power the Ion Drive. The Ion Drive uses no chemical fuel cell, so endurance is not a significant issue. Dont quote me on this, I heard about this on a documentary years ago on the History Channel.
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We should install a salvage wing on the ISS to fetch space debris/junk/expired satellites/ broken motherships.. and use those parts to build new probes and expand the ISS.
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The people at MSNBC said this? Its always interesting to me that someone that has no credentials other than their natural facial features (and some of them not so natural) makes up to $2000000 a year for reading off a piece of paper. Then they have the audacity to think that makes them smarter than the people that planned space missions step-by-step.
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Deep Space One is a space probe that was sent in space a few years back. I believe it was the first man-made probe to use the Ion Drive. It collects solar energy from the sun and stars and converts it to usable energy. The energy can then be used to power the Ion Drive. The Ion Drive uses no chemical fuel cell, so endurance is not a significant issue. Dont quote me on this, I heard about this on a documentary years ago on the History Channel.
Actually, Deep Space One was launched in 1998. In 1970 NASA launched an ion test drive in a rocket and it ran for 161 days. In 1997 Boeing launched two geosynchronous satelites (Boeing 601HP and Boeing702) which use ion propulsion systems. However, Deep Space One is the first space craft to use ion drive as a primary means of propulsion. NASA ran the engine for 200 days. The longest sustained engine run in spacecraft history.
Deep Space One's ion drive produced from 20 to 90 mN of thrust. The electricity needed for the ion drive comes from the 2.5kW solar array attached to DS1. The mass was provided by a store of Xenon gas aboard the ship.
EDIT: Russia also has several satellites in orbit which also use ion drive systems. I do not have data on when they were launched.
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Deep Space One is a space probe that was sent in space a few years back. I believe it was the first man-made probe to use the Ion Drive. It collects solar energy from the sun and stars and converts it to usable energy. The energy can then be used to power the Ion Drive. The Ion Drive uses no chemical fuel cell, so endurance is not a significant issue. Dont quote me on this, I heard about this on a documentary years ago on the History Channel.
An ion drive uses reaction mass just like a conventional rocket, so it has a finite endurance. However since it uses solar power to propel the reaction mass it is a lot more fuel efficient than chemical rocket engines.
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Okay having read the article I cant slam MSNBC except for backing the loons on the commission by publishing that (slanted) article.
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Where's the starship Enterprise when we need it? :D
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a permanent moon base is needed next. And the path is not earth to moon , it is earth to space station to moon to mars.
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Where's the starship Enterprise when we need it? :D
That's basically what I think is REALLY needed to move manned space exploration forward: Some form of permanently space-based vessel for long-distance manned missions, serviced by cheap expendable rockets lifting supplies and crew to the ISS until a more feasible reusable vessel can be developed.
And unlike what Dragon is suggesting, it probably wouldn't be so hard to construct a vessel the size of the orbiter in prefabricated modules and blast them into orbit for final assembly that it would be obsolete before it pays for the fuel costs of doing so. Especially if, like I said, if there was a high-efficiency propulsion system (IE, ion or plasma) to further reduce fuel costs. Once in space you don't need the huge thrust-to-weight ratio that earth-bound vessels would. Using the gravity of the earth and moon as slingshots would further lessen the fuel requirements of accelerating to acceptable speeds for interplanetary travel.
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why bother with space exploration?........ Planet X is coming to us soon :O
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why bother with space exploration?........ Planet X is coming to us soon :O
You seen that video too? lol I don't believe that honestly.
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Especially if, like I said, if there was a high-efficiency propulsion system (IE, ion or plasma) to further reduce fuel costs. Once in space you don't need the huge thrust-to-weight ratio that earth-bound vessels would. Using the gravity of the earth and moon as slingshots would further lessen the fuel requirements of accelerating to acceptable speeds for interplanetary travel.
If I could just find the anti-matter that I have somewhere around here in a transparent aluminum box, we would be all set.
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If I could just find the anti-matter that I have somewhere around here in a transparent aluminum box, we would be all set.
There's no need to be a smartass about it. I never said it needed to be an exotic propulsion system.
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Lighten up Francis. It was meant as humor. :neener:
Things like this do bother me though, taken from today's paper;
Two minutes in, the mockup upper stage that more than 200 Glenn engineers, technicians and managers have spent the last 40 months designing and building will separate from the spent booster that carried it aloft. Moving at almost five times the speed of sound, it will climb 4 more miles on momentum, then plunge toward the Atlantic Ocean. On impact, the 430,000-pound rocket segment will sink like a rock.
"It'll be a fish reef," said Vince Bilardo, who managed the Glenn Center's intensive effort to build the $53 million upper stage simulator.
Glenn is less than 10 minutes down the road from me, I'm half tempted to walk down there and ask why they don't put a parachute on 53 million dollars of our money.
http://www.cleveland.com/science/index.ssf/2009/10/post_1.html (http://www.cleveland.com/science/index.ssf/2009/10/post_1.html)
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That's basically what I think is REALLY needed to move manned space exploration forward: Some form of permanently space-based vessel for long-distance manned missions, serviced by cheap expendable rockets lifting supplies and crew to the ISS until a more feasible reusable vessel can be developed.
[snip]
Saxman, I really like the idea, but for things as complex as manned spacecraft, they've really got to be inspected between each flight - I don't really see how you could do this easily in space.
Also, Dragon: there's nothing really useful that NASA could get out of salvaging the mockup upper stage - the cost of putting a parachute on it, and then sending a boat out to recover whatever was left of it would probably be more expensive than what they could recover from it.
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Lighten up Francis. It was meant as humor. :neener:
Glenn is less than 10 minutes down the road from me, I'm half tempted to walk down there and ask why they don't put a parachute on 53 million dollars of our money.
http://www.cleveland.com/science/index.ssf/2009/10/post_1.html (http://www.cleveland.com/science/index.ssf/2009/10/post_1.html)
parachuts costs money, can't be wasting money like that.
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I love how NASA is incredibly cool and a huge waste of money at the same time. We can all think of more useful things to do with the money, and the rebuttal always amounts to the same thing: "but it's so cool! We can go to space, man!" Somehow I still find myself persuaded that we should do it.
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I love how NASA is incredibly cool and a huge waste of money at the same time. We can all think of more useful things to do with the money, and the rebuttal always amounts to the same thing: "but it's so cool! We can go to space, man!" Somehow I still find myself persuaded that we should do it.
I disagree with the argument that space exploration is a waste of money. I think people who believe that have a very short sighted view. A typical argument goes "How come we're spending billions on space exploration, when there are people in poverty and starving all over earth." So... we could spend billions on poverty and starvation now, and when that money/food is gone the problem still exists. Or, we could get support space exploration, ocean exploration, and many other scientific endeavors which will expand our knowledge and technology so that we can come up with real solutions to problems.
Think about it, if we commit to send a manned mission to Mars, imagine what we would learn about agriculture and food production while developing a way to feed the astronauts on Mars. That same technology could be adapted to agriculture here on earth to feed starving kids in Africa. Same goes for energy sources, and other problems we face. How much technology do we have today that is a result of the space race in the 60s?
I look at space exploration as a challenge to be met, and in meeting that challenge who knows what we might learn that can help us.
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Its my understanding that the moon will serve as the test bed for most, if not all, of the gear that will be installed/used on Mars.
Seems a sound plan to me.
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Obviously all we need to do is come up with a Gateless Jump System. Oh, wait. (http://forum.egosoft.com/images/smiles/icon_xbtf.gif)
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Its my understanding that the moon will serve as the test bed for most, if not all, of the gear that will be installed/used on Mars.
Seems a sound plan to me.
I definitely agree. The notion of us going straight to Mars is impractical in the extreme. As challenging as just getting to the moon is, Mars is even a more drastic undertaking, especially if we were to attempt it on a direct flight from earth.
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The moon must be the first permanently manned base ...for once there it can act as a shipyard and jump off point.
Once ships are built they can be flown to earth orbit and receive their crews and go their merry way.
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I love how NASA is incredibly cool and a huge waste of money at the same time. We can all think of more useful things to do with the money, and the rebuttal always amounts to the same thing: "but it's so cool! We can go to space, man!" Somehow I still find myself persuaded that we should do it.
Being curious, wanting to explore is part of being human. For that reason alone it's important to travel into space.
In any case, what's NASA's budget? Compared to, say the defense budget?
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In any case, what's NASA's budget? Compared to, say the defense budget?
Here's (http://rapidshare.com/files/297089192/budgetgraphic.jpg) a rather large graphic that shows ratios of budgets in America, 2004.
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haha an 1800kb .jpg that's awesome
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3500x2333 :D
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I love how NASA is incredibly cool and a huge waste of money at the same time. We can all think of more useful things to do with the money, and the rebuttal always amounts to the same thing: "but it's so cool! We can go to space, man!" Somehow I still find myself persuaded that we should do it.
OK remind me to NOT discuss this with you when we are flying. :D
We get more from the investment in space exploration than we get from dumping money into the bottemless pit which is most government spending programs.
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Drone good idea. I wonder how much total tonnage of stuff is up there. If it were all collected and truned into Planet Bling we could have it battle the Moon's effect on the oceans and calm them, stop weather and maybe have a nice weekend once in awhile. Oh yeah....yup
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Drone good idea. I wonder how much total tonnage of stuff is up there. If it were all collected and truned into Planet Bling we could have it battle the Moon's effect on the oceans and calm them, stop weather and maybe have a nice weekend once in awhile. Oh yeah....yup
Yeah. And totally screw up the planet in the process.
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I love how NASA is incredibly cool and a huge waste of money at the same time. We can all think of more useful things to do with the money, and the rebuttal always amounts to the same thing: "but it's so cool! We can go to space, man!" Somehow I still find myself persuaded that we should do it.
We do get some return on our investment. So far NASA has filed more than 6,300 patents and every day most of us enjoy something they've pioneered/helped invent.
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Since the plan was announced under Bush, I've thought the moon first route was a waste, and some variation of Zubrin's Mars Direct should have been the way to go.
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I disagree with the argument that space exploration is a waste of money. I think people who believe that have a very short sighted view. A typical argument goes "How come we're spending billions on space exploration, when there are people in poverty and starving all over earth." So... we could spend billions on poverty and starvation now, and when that money/food is gone the problem still exists. Or, we could get support space exploration, ocean exploration, and many other scientific endeavors which will expand our knowledge and technology so that we can come up with real solutions to problems.
Think about it, if we commit to send a manned mission to Mars, imagine what we would learn about agriculture and food production while developing a way to feed the astronauts on Mars. That same technology could be adapted to agriculture here on earth to feed starving kids in Africa. Same goes for energy sources, and other problems we face. How much technology do we have today that is a result of the space race in the 60s?
I look at space exploration as a challenge to be met, and in meeting that challenge who knows what we might learn that can help us.
I don't come at this from an altruistic perspective. I don't think the fact that people are starving has anything to do with whether the money is well spent. It's simply a matter of benefit from the effort. From what I understand about the martian climate, and even with the small presence of H2O, the probability of successfully terraforming Mars into a life-supporting planet is ~.001. Unmanned spacecraft are far more cost effective, and can go much further distances and to more hostile places, and that means better value. As for increasing our knowledge about the ocean, that is money very well spent.
In any case, what's NASA's budget? Compared to, say the defense budget?
You know that the defense budget is irrelevant for calculating the value of NASA.
Anyway, I've said my piece. I have a very good friend who is adamant that we go to Mars. He even built a space-suit for an engineering project in college. We've argued almost every point in this debate, but I still believe that it's the non-rational part of me that thinks sending people to other planets is a good idea, at least for now.
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From what I understand about the martian climate, and even with the small presence of H2O, the probability of successfully terraforming Mars into a life-supporting planet is ~.001.
Lol, I was reading this and thought "Dr. McKay would disagree with that", then googled Mars terraforming and of course found a page citing who else but McKay :)
http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~mfogg/zubrin.htm
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Lol, I was reading this and thought "Dr. McKay would disagree with that", then googled Mars terraforming and of course found a page citing who else but McKay :)
http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~mfogg/zubrin.htm
That's a good article!
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Anyone who thinks spaceflight is a waste of money should read this:
http://www.resonancepub.com/space.htm (http://www.resonancepub.com/space.htm)
It's also here, and several other places on the web: http://nasawatch.com/archives/2008/05/ernst-stuhlinger.html (http://nasawatch.com/archives/2008/05/ernst-stuhlinger.html)
Why Explore Space?
A Letter from Ernst Stuhlinger
Some of the reasons for exploring space, when there are numerous social problems on Earth were addressed in a letter dated 6 May 1970 by Dr. Ernst Stuhlinger, Associate Director for Science at the Marshall Space Flight Center, in Huntsville. Dr. Stuhlinger is known internationally for his contributions for a manned journey to Mars. He lives in Huntsville, Alabama. His beliefs were expressed in his reply to a letter from Sister Mary Jucunda, a nun who worked among the starving children of Kabwe, Zambie, Africa. Touched by Sister Mary's concern and sincerity, Dr. Stuhlinger answered her letter as follows:
"Your letter was one of many which are reaching me every day, but it has touched me more deeply than all the others because it came so much from the depths of a searching mind and a compassionate heart. I will try to answer your question as best as I possibly can.
First, however, I would like to express my great admiration for you, and for all your many brave sisters, because you are dedicating your lives to the noblest cause of man: help for his fellowmen who are in need.
You asked in your letter how I could suggest the expenditures of billions of dollars for a voyage to Mars, at a time when many children on this earth are starving to death. I know that you do not expect an answer such as "Oh, I did not know that there are children dying from hunger, but from now on I will desist from any kind of space research until mankind has solved that problem!" In fact, I have known of famined children long before I knew that a voyage to the planet Mars is technically feasible. However, I believe, like many of my friends, that travelling to the Moon and eventually to Mars and to other planets is a venture which we should undertake now, and I even believe that this project, in the long run, will contribute more to the solution of these grave problems we are facing here on earth than many other potential projects of help which are debated and discussed year after year, and which are so extremely slow in yielding tangible results.
Before trying to describe in more detail how our space program is contributing to the solution of our earthly problems, I would like to relate briefly a supposedly true story, which may help support the argument. About 400 years ago, there lived a count in a small town in Germany. He was one of the benign counts, and he gave a large part of his income to the poor in his town. This was much appreciated, because poverty was abundant during medieval times, and there were epidemics of the plague which ravaged the country frequently. One day, the count met a strange man. He had a workbench and little laboratory in his house, and he labored hard during the daytime so that he could afford a few hours every evening to work in his laboratory. He ground small lenses from pieces of glass; he mounted the lenses in tubes, and he used these gadgets to look at very small objects. The count was particularly fascinated by the tiny creatures that could be observed with the strong magnification, and which he had never seen before. He invited the man to move with his laboratory to the castle, to become a member of the count's household, and to devote henceforth all his time to the development and perfection of his optical gadgets as a special employee of the count.
The townspeople, however, became angry when they realized that the count was wasting his money, as they thought, on a stunt without purpose. "We are suffering from this plague" they said, "while he is paying that man for a useless hobby!" But the count remained firm. "I give you as much as I can afford," he said, "but I will also support this man and his work, because I know that someday something will come out of it!"
Indeed, something very good came out of this work, and also out of similar work done by others at other places: the microscope. It is well known that the microscope has contributed more than any other invention to the progress of medicine, and that the elimination of the plague and many other contagious diseases from most parts of the world is largely a result of studies which the microscope made possible.
The count, by retaining some of his spending money for research and discovery, contributed far more to the relief of human suffering than he could have contributed by giving all he could possibly spare to his plague-ridden community.
The situation which we are facing today is similar in many respects. The President of the United States is spending about 200 billion dollars in his yearly budget. This money goes to health, education, welfare, urban renewal, highways, transportation, foreign aid, defense, conservation, science, agriculture and many installations inside and outside the country. About 1.6 percent of this national budget was allocated to space exploration this year. The space program includes Project Apollo, and many other smaller projects in space physics, space astronomy, space biology, planetary projects, earth resources projects, and space engineering. To make this expenditure for the space program possible, the average American taxpayer with 10,000 dollars income per year is paying about 30 tax dollars for space. The rest of his income, 9,970 dollars, remains for his subsistence, his recreation, his savings, his other taxes, and all his other expenditures.
You will probably ask now: "Why don't you take 5 or 3 or 1 dollar out of the 30 space dollars which the average American taxpayer is paying, and send these dollars to the hungry children?" To answer this question, I have to explain briefly how the economy of this country works. The situation is very similar in other countries. The government consists of a number of departments (Interior, Justice, Health, Education and Welfare, Transportation, Defense, and others) and the bureaus (National Science Foundation, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, and others). All of them prepare their yearly budgets according to their assigned missions, and each of them must defend its budget against extremely severe screening by congressional committees, and against heavy pressure for economy from the Bureau of the Budget and the President. When the funds are finally appropriated by Congress, they can be spent only for the line items specified and approved in the budget.
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The budget of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, naturally, can contain only items directly related to aeronautics and space. If this budget were not approved by Congress, the funds proposed for it would not be available for something else; they would simply not be levied from the taxpayer, unless one of the other budgets had obtained approval for a specific increase which would then absorb the funds not spent for space. You realize from this brief discourse that support for hungry children, or rather a support in addition to what the United States is already contributing to this very worthy cause in the form of foreign aid, can be obtained only if the appropriate department submits a budget line item for this purpose, and if this line item is then approved by Congress.
You may ask now whether I personally would be in favor of such a move by our government. My answer is an emphatic yes. Indeed, I would not mind at all if my annual taxes were increased by a number of dollars for the purpose of feeding hungry children, wherever they may live.
I know that all of my friends feel the same way. However, we could not bring such a program to life merely by desisting from making plans for voyages to Mars. On the contrary, I even believe that by working for the space program I can make some contribution to the relief and eventual solution of such grave problems as poverty and hunger on earth. Basic to the hunger problem are two functions: the production of food and the distribution of food. Food production by agriculture, cattle ranching, ocean fishing and other large-scale operations is efficient in some parts of the world, but drastically deficient in many others. For example, large areas of land could be utilized far better if efficient methods of watershed control, fertilizer use, weather forecasting, fertility assessment, plantation programming, field selection, planting habits, timing of cultivation, crop survey and harvest planning were applied.
The best tool for the improvement of all these functions, undoubtedly, is the artificial earth satellite. Circling the globe at a high altitude, it can screen wide areas of land within a short time; it can observe and measure a large variety of factors indicating the status and condition of crops, soil, droughts, rainfall, snow cover, etc., and it can radio this information to ground stations for appropriate use. It has been estimated that even a modest system of earth satellites equipped with earth resources, sensors, working within a program for worldwide agricultural improvements, will increase the yearly crops by an equivalent of many billions of dollars.
The distribution of the food to the needy is a completely different problem. The question is not so much one of shipping volume, it is one of international cooperation. The ruler of a small nation may feel very uneasy about the prospect of having large quantities of food shipped into his country by a large nation, simply because he fears that along with the food there may also be an import of influence and foreign power. Efficient relief from hunger, I am afraid, will not come before the boundaries between nations have become less divisive than they are today. I do not believe that space flight will accomplish this miracle over night. However, the space program is certainly among the most promising and powerful agents working in this direction.
Let me only remind you of the recent near-tragedy of Apollo 13. When the time of the crucial reentry of the astronauts approached, the Soviet Union discontinued all Russian radio transmissions in the frequency bands used by the Apollo Project in order to avoid any possible interference, and Russian ships stationed themselves in the Pacific and the Atlantic Oceans in case an emergency rescue would become necessary. Had the astronaut capsule touched down near a Russian ship, the Russians would undoubtedly have expended as much care and effort in their rescue as if Russian cosmonauts had returned from a space trip. If Russian space travelers should ever be in a similar emergency situation, Americans would do the same without any doubt.
Higher food production through survey and assessment from orbit, and better food distribution through improved international relations, are only two examples of how profoundly the space program will impact life on earth. I would like to quote two other examples: stimulation of technological development, and generation of scientific knowledge.
The requirements for high precision and for extreme reliability which must be imposed upon the components of a moon-travelling spacecraft are entirely unprecedented in the history of engineering. The development of systems which meet these severe requirements has provided us a unique opportunity to find new material and methods, to invent better technical systems, to improve manufacturing procedures, to lengthen the lifetimes of instruments, and even to discover new laws of nature.
All this newly acquired technical knowledge is also available for application to earth-bound technologies. Every year, about a thousand technical innovations generated in the space program find their ways into our earthly technology where they lead to better kitchen appliances and farm equipment, better sewing machines and radios, better ships and airplanes, better weather forecasting and storm warning, better communications, better medical instruments, better utensils and tools for everyday life. Presumably, you will ask now why we must develop first a life support system for our moon-travelling astronauts, before we can build a remote-reading sensor system for heart patients. The answer is simple: significant progress in the solutions of technical problems is frequently made not by a direct approach, but by first setting a goal of high challenge which offers a strong motivation for innovative work, which fires the imagination and spurs men to expend their best efforts, and which acts as a catalyst by including chains of other reactions.
Spaceflight without any doubt is playing exactly this role. The voyage to Mars will certainly not be a direct source of food for the hungry. However, it will lead to so many new technologies and capabilities that the spin-offs from this project alone will be worth many times the cost of its implementation.
Besides the need for new technologies, there is a continuing great need for new basic knowledge in the sciences if we wish to improve the conditions of human life on earth. We need more knowledge in physics and chemistry, in biology and physiology, and very particularly in medicine to cope with all these problems which threaten man's life: hunger, disease, contamination of food and water, pollution of the environment.
We need more young men and women who choose science as a career and we need better support for those scientists who have the talent and the determination to engage in fruitful research work. Challenging research objectives must be available, and sufficient support for research projects must be provided. Again, the space program with its wonderful opportunities to engage in truly magnificent research studies of moons and planets, of physics and astronomy, of biology and medicine is an almost ideal catalyst which induces the reaction between the motivation for scientific work, opportunities to observe exciting phenomena of nature, and material support needed to carry out the research effort.
Among all the activities which are directed, controlled, and funded by the American government, the space program is certainly the most visible and probably the most debated activity, although it consumes only 1.6 percent of the total national budget, and 3 per mille [less than one-third of 1 percent] of the gross national product. As a stimulant and catalyst for the development of new technologies, and for research in the basic sciences, it is unparalleled by any other activity. In this respect, we may even say that the space program is taking over a function which for three or four thousand years has been the sad prerogative of wars.
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How much human suffering can be avoided if nations, instead of competing with their bomb-dropping fleets of airplanes and rockets, compete with their moon-travelling space ships! This competition is full of promise for brilliant victories, but it leaves no room for the bitter fate of the vanquished, which breeds nothing but revenge and new wars.
Although our space program seems to lead us away from our earth and out toward the moon, the sun, the planets, and the stars, I believe that none of these celestial objects will find as much attention and study by space scientists as our earth. It will become a better earth, not only because of all the new technological and scientific knowledge which we will apply to the betterment of life, but also because we are developing a far deeper appreciation of our earth, of life, and of man.
The photograph which I enclose with this letter shows a view of our earth as seen from Apollo 8 when it orbited the moon at Christmas, 1968. Of all the many wonderful results of the space program so far, this picture may be the most important one. It opened our eyes to the fact that our earth is a beautiful and most precious island in an unlimited void, and that there is no other place for us to live but the thin surface layer of our planet, bordered by the bleak nothingness of space. Never before did so many people recognize how limited our earth really is, and how perilous it would be to tamper with its ecological balance. Ever since this picture was first published, voices have become louder and louder warning of the grave problems that confront man in our times: pollution, hunger, poverty, urban living, food production, water control, overpopulation. It is certainly not by accident that we begin to see the tremendous tasks waiting for us at a time when the young space age has provided us the first good look at our own planet.
wpe42.jpg (9916 bytes)
Very fortunately though, the space age not only holds out a mirror in which we can see ourselves, it also provides us with the technologies, the challenge, the motivation, and even with the optimism to attack these tasks with confidence. What we learn in our space program, I believe, is fully supporting what Albert Schweitzer had in mind when he said: "I am looking at the future with concern, but with good hope."
My very best wishes will always be with you, and with your children.
Very sincerely yours,
Ernst Stuhlinger
Associate Director for Science."
Footnote:
Having read Dr. Stuhlinger's letter, Sister Mary responded :
"…thank you - from now on, I firmly believe in the profound value of the space program…"
DR. ERNST STUHLINGER
Born in Germany in 1913, Dr. Stuhlinger received a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Tuebingen in 1936. He was a member of the German rocket development team at Peenemunde, and came to the United States in 1946, and worked for the U.S. Army at Fort Bliss, Texas. He moved to Huntsville in 1950 and continued working for the Army at Redstone Arsenal until the Marshall Center was formed in 1960. Dr. Stuhlinger has received numerous awards and widespread recognition for research in propulsion. He received the Exceptional Civilian Service Award for his part in launching of Explorer 1, America's first earth satellite.
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I would rather see us explore something like 'Project Orion' than continue to waste our time with chemical rockets..
Taylor and Dyson were convinced that chemical rockets, with their limited payloads and high cost, represented the wrong approach to space travel. Orion, they argued, was simple, capacious, and above all affordable. Taylor originally proposed that the vehicle be launched from the ground, probably from the nuclear test site at love muffin Flats, Nevada. Sixteen stories high, shaped like the tip of a bullet, and with a pusher plate 41 m in diameter, the spacecraft would have utilized a launch pad composed of eight towers, each 76 m high. Remarkably, most of the takeoff mass of about 10,000 tons would have gone into orbit. The bomb units ejected on takeoff at a rate of one per second would have yielded 0.1 kiloton; then, as the vehicle accelerated, the ejection rate would have slowed and the yield increased, until 20-kiloton bombs would have been exploding every 10 seconds.
It was a startling and revolutionary idea. At a time when the United States was struggling to put a single astronaut into orbit using a modified ballistic missile, Taylor and Dyson were hatching plans to send scores of people and enormous payloads on voyages of exploration throughout the solar system. The original Orion design called for 2,000 pulse units, far more than the number needed to reach Earth escape velocity. In scale, Orion more closely resembled the giant spaceships of science fiction than the cramped capsules of Gagarin and Glenn. One hundred and fifty people could have lived aboard in relative comfort in a vehicle built without the need for close attention to weight-saving measures.
http://bbs.hitechcreations.com/smf/index.php?action=post;topic=276558.30;num_replies=41
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Getting to the topic, I am baffled with NASA here.
Okay, skip the Moon. 4 days away. Go straight to Mars, but land on a rock that's orbiting Mars, 5 months flight. WTF????? It's the same distance as Mars, just to plonk down on that rock that isn't even round, and has practically no gravity.
The Moon has been done, but we're out of training. And FROM the Moon one could perhaps build missions. A manned mission to Mars, - or it's moon,- is vastly more challenging.
BTW, Mars is just slightly bigger than the Moon and has similar gravity. People tend to think it's about like Earth, but it's very much NOT so. Wanna build a base? Pick 4 days vs 5 months and something that has been done vs something that hasn't....
NASA..... :bolt:
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that NASA skip a return to the moon,
are you sure 100% , about "Moon landing" ? or was the most expensive movie ever made?
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I do hope you are being sarcastic GHI,and you do know that we went to the moon.
That being said,I dont think it will be in our lifetime that we send a human to mars..Takes about what,6 months or so to get there,by the time they do get there,neg G's will have affected strength,and I can just see someone stepping off the steps and breaking a leg..Not to mention the radiation which is flying through space to cause injury.
I dont really see a space outpost on the moon either.I mean even IF they do get a plan together to start sending material up there to start constructing,it will be at least a century before it is completed.(READ AS) being able to stay for any extended length of time,6mos. to a year on the moon.And the cost..trillions
I do appreciate the curiosity of men to want to accomplish these things,they are indeed grand,but reality has to step in and men have to give real,legitimate thought to just what it is they are saying...
Mankind will never get out of the solar system,we just dont have the technology to go faster than the speed of light,it is impossible,it will never happen..And when you consider the nearest stars are thousands of light years away,well,here again is where reality steps in..
I am ALL for exploring space with unmanned spacecraft,launching HUGE telescopes,experiments,etc..etc..
But when it is all said and done.Space is just too hazardous to man.
I love what the united states has accomplished in space,or for that matter any country curious enough to go up and take a look. But frankly,With all the redtape,the trillions of dollars it would cost us,and not to mention the ability of man to really pollute just about everything we touch,I just cant see it.
I know,I know,men were pessimistic about many things which have now come to pass,so please dont bother wasting your time typing that others also said such negative things about flying,or rockets going into space,or the horse being replaced,etc..etc..
I actually am optimistic that we will find out many great things in working in space,and if it does come to pass,like people going to mars,I say well done.But it will not be done anytime soon.
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the earth is flat, if you sail too far you will fall off the edge. That is if the sea monsters don't get you first.
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the earth is flat, if you sail too far you will fall off the edge. That is if the sea monsters don't get you first.
ahhhh,but they had the capability to get to the edge..
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I know,I know,men were pessimistic about many things which have now come to pass,so please dont bother wasting your time typing that others also said such negative things about flying,or rockets going into space,or the horse being replaced,etc..etc..
I actually am optimistic that we will find out many great things in working in space,and if it does come to pass,like people going to mars,I say well done.But it will not be done anytime soon.
Until I read this, I was going to say just that ;). In fact I will anyway, just cause I feel like it :D. But seriously, a few hundred years ago people probably could not possibly conceive how we would ever, EVER be able to fly. Now flying is basically commonplace. In those few hundred years, people haven't changed that much: we're more advanced technologically, but we're still short-sighted and rather closed-minded(sp?) about the future - just because we can't imagine a way to do something doesn't mean we can't do it.
Also, about your last paragraph: I agree completely lol.
BTW, Mars is just slightly bigger than the Moon and has similar gravity. People tend to think it's about like Earth, but it's very much NOT so. Wanna build a base? Pick 4 days vs 5 months and something that has been done vs something that hasn't....
Actually, Mars is about twice the size of the Moon, and has about twice the gravity. And it has a substantial atmosphere, unlike the Moon.
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Dragon,
Keep in mind propulsion models like electrodynamic drives that have high specific impulse but low thrust-to-weight ratios become much more feasible once you no longer have to worry about escaping atmosphere (highly efficient drives like electrodynamic/static don't have the thrust to escape atmosphere). The capability of greater fuel efficiency under these propulsion models would at least appear to lead to a quicker return on the investment than if conventional chemical rockets were used.
Dragon is correct. Indisputable.
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I do hope you are being sarcastic GHI,and you do know that we went to the moon.
No i'm not sarcastic, i used to believe 100% in Moon landing, i still believe but i have some doubts,in last 5-10 years i've been watching and reading from Mythbusters to Discovery magazines all kind of questions without answers about Moon landing. And about 11% of Americans don't believe it, why should i ?
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No i'm not sarcastic, i used to believe 100% in Moon landing, i still believe but i have some doubts,in last 5-10 years i've been watching and reading from Mythbusters to Discovery magazines all kind of questions without answers about Moon landing. And about 11% of Americans don't believe it, why should i ?
The world is full of idiots. Why should you be one of them?
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/multimedia/lroimages/apollosites.html
In my opinion the first nut we need to crack is fully-reusable-single-stage-to-orbit. The most expensive part of any space flight is getting it off the ground and into orbit.
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In my opinion the first nut we need to crack is fully-reusable-single-stage-to-orbit. The most expensive part of any space flight is getting it off the ground and into orbit.
They had it figured out 30 years ago.. Why hasn't NASA acquired the technology and run with it?
http://www.crazyabouttv.com/salvage1.html
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Yossarian
"Actually, Mars is about twice the size of the Moon, and has about twice the gravity. And it has a substantial atmosphere, unlike the Moon"
Okay, I am a tad uncareful, but Mars only has 1/10th of Earth's mass, 38% of the gravity, and 1% of the atmospheric pressure. Which is pretty...close to nothing. Size compares such:
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2a/Mars_Earth_Comparison.png)
Has a looong way to be earth like. And the moons?
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a4/Phobos_deimos_diff_rotated.jpg)
Or rocks....escape velocity 40 and 20 km/h. Don't go too much on the trampolin there :D
Anyway, Mars is more interesting. It's just that it's that much further away, and not as big as most think, and.... there's soon 40 years since we were on the moon....
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The world is full of idiots. Why should you be one of them?
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/multimedia/lroimages/apollosites.html
Idiots are those who believe without searching, i've seen those 19th century quality pics above in news this year. There was technology 30 years ago,to read "Pravda" newspaper in Red Square,through thick atmosphere from satelite orbiting 200 miles above, and this blurry pics taken by NASA in 2009 prove what?
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this blurry pics taken by NASA in 2009 prove what?
That you'd complain about us spending as much on a disposable moon probe as a spy satellite, if we did.
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There was technology 30 years ago,to read "Pravda" newspaper in Red Square,through thick atmosphere from satelite orbiting 200 miles above, and this blurry pics taken by NASA in 2009 prove what?
It proves we have satellites circling the earth and not the moon.
Ghi, you are approaching the 'tin foil hat' wearing zone.
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Mankind will never get out of the solar system,we just dont have the technology to go faster than the speed of light,it is impossible,it will never happen..And when you consider the nearest stars are thousands of light years away,well,here again is where reality steps in..
You need to do more research. Alpha Centauri is 4.37 light years from our solar system. Not "thousands of light years". :rolleyes:
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And if you like parsecs it sounds even closer. ;)
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Additionally, there are physics models showing that warp drive IS a theoretical possibility, we just haven't reached that technological stage to be able to do it (subspace folding a'la Star Trek CAN work, we just don't have the technology to do so yet).
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Mythbusters to Discovery magazines all kind of questions without answers about Moon landing.
I'd be very curious to know which of the "questions" have remained "unanswered." Every "question" I've ever seen put forth by the deniers has completely explained. And in fact, it's usually the deniers that show themselves to have shaky, if any, understanding of science/physics.
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Here's a you tube vid covering the 'deep space 1' mission using the ion drive..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqU4MP03Rs0&feature=related
and another vid covering 'project orion'....
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=18L4E4myDAs&feature=related
:x
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Personally I think we should start with the moon for the same reason someone else stated, because it has been done for short tiem periods already. Learning how to cope with problems of a long term base on another body could be very useful not to mention these are leasons being learned while much closer to Earth which equals a safer means of learning these lessons. I am not saying that it should be a place to stop over at on the way to Mars but I do think that it would be a good stepping stone. I would probably put this into the category of "baby-steps".
As far as terra-forming Mars as someone mentioned earlier, the one thing everyone seems to forget about when talking about that process is radiation. As far as I know Mars does not have the molten core that Earth does therfore there is no magnetic field to repell radiation from the Sun. This would mean that in order to have life existing out side man-made protective bubbles, we would need to engineer plant and animal life to be able to exist in high radiation enviroments. I know there are some bacteria and other small life forms that can survive such an enviroment but I don't think the are anything that alone would make any planet considered to be terra-formed.
I think that Mars should be explorered for the knowledge reasoning but to do it with the notion of terra-froming is a little far fetched.
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I think that Mars should be explorered for the knowledge reasoning but to do it with the notion of terra-froming is a little far fetched.
I should mention that although the probability I gave for terraformng Mars may seem extremely skeptical at ~.001, I'm simply thinking of all the assumptions that go into it and multiplying their probabilities together. For example, .001 is a little worse than nine coin flips, just to put things in perspective.
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Idiots are those who believe without searching, i've seen those 19th century quality pics above in news this year. There was technology 30 years ago,to read "Pravda" newspaper in Red Square,through thick atmosphere from satelite orbiting 200 miles above, and this blurry pics taken by NASA in 2009 prove what?
Point of order: The satellite may orbit at 200 miles (well actually probably about 400, but whatever). The moon orbits at roughly 250,000 miles. Huge difference.
Also, you mention that 11% of Americans don't believe in the Moon landings, and thus why should you. I would like to point out that 50% of all people are below average in intelligence.
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You need to do more research. Alpha Centauri is 4.37 light years from our solar system. Not "thousands of light years". :rolleyes:
LOL,thank you fencer,I stand corrected.but my point still stands,we will NEVER get there,unfortunetly.
GHI,The first landing laid out a reflector on the moon so that a laser could be shot at it and we can measure how far the moon is from the earth at any given time..And as I recall,the MYTHBUSTERS show basically PROVED we DID go to the moon.or at least what people said were reasons why we didnt were wrong.
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Idiots are those who believe without searching, i've seen those 19th century quality pics above in news this year. There was technology 30 years ago,to read "Pravda" newspaper in Red Square,through thick atmosphere from satelite orbiting 200 miles above, and this blurry pics taken by NASA in 2009 prove what?
Fine. Be one of the idiots then.
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Did you forgot about the loads of moon-rock and moon-dust that the astonauts brought back from the moon GHI?
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No i'm not sarcastic, i used to believe 100% in Moon landing, i still believe but i have some doubts,in last 5-10 years i've been watching and reading from Mythbusters to Discovery magazines all kind of questions without answers about Moon landing. And about 11% of Americans don't believe it, why should i ?
Are you one of those guys who believe the earth is flat and hollow??? :rolleyes:
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Additionally, there are physics models showing that warp drive IS a theoretical possibility, we just haven't reached that technological stage to be able to do it (subspace folding a'la Star Trek CAN work, we just don't have the technology to do so yet).
I never truly understood the subspace folding theory, though my rough understanding of it came from the "How William Shatner Changed the World" special from a couple of years back. I was never sure whether or not the folded subspace affected the entire universe, and thus wondered how we could have multiple ships traveling at the same time, as that would mess up their locations, similar to a person in zero-g environments that has applied both forward and leftward motions in an attempt to go directly forward, causing him to not arrive at the destination, but rather off by a certain amount. I still want a shuttle and that motorcycle from the recent movie though.
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When you fold subspace you're not folding it across the universe, only immediately surrounding your ship. Specifically, if I'm remembering the mechanics right, you're altering subspace to create a high-density bubble behind you and a less dense bubble ahead of you. The result is that the ship is drawn forward by the low-density bubble and pushed by the high-density bubble. The reason why the result is PERCEIVED faster than light travel by an outside observer is because of relativity. The ship never actually accelerates beyond the speed of light, but because of the interaction of the low-density subspace bubble with normal space-time, the ship reaches its destination at a much higher velocity than would be possible even though PRACTICALLY the ship is not traveling any faster than it would in normal space (think of it as taking a cutoff, rather than a road that loops around).
The beauty of this mechanism is that, if the theory is correct, there will be no effects of time dilation. If you leave earth on March 5th, 2010 at 9pm and make a five-hour trip in this manner, your clock and the clock of an observer back on earth will still be synchronized at 2AM March 6th when you arrive at your destination. Whereas if a craft travels at relativistic speeds (accelerating to a significant fraction of the speed of light within normal space-time) your clock may show only 5 hours passing, but to an outside observer 5 YEARS (if not more) might have passed.
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.
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Here's a more specific description of the theory:
Alcubierre Drive (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive)
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Aww, I liked that post.
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Here's a more specific description of the theory:
Alcubierre Drive (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive)
[play]star trek TOS theme[/play]
(http://www.daviddarling.info/images/warp_drive.gif)
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/A/Alcubdrive.html
:D
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[play]star trek TOS theme[/play]
(http://www.daviddarling.info/images/warp_drive.gif)
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/A/Alcubdrive.html
:D
General Relativity for Dummies, right?
:D
But yeah, that's basically how it works.
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Are you one of those guys who believe the earth is flat and hollow??? :rolleyes:
That's preposterous! :old:
There is no way the earth can be both flat and hollow. Therefore, it would have to be one or the other. :D
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who ever said we stopped going to the moon in the first place,after all we only see the same side. For all we know the NSA or CIA could beup there alot
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33435155/ns/technology_and_science-space
An independent commission is recommending that NASA skip a return to the moon, and aim directly for either an asteroid nearby or one of the Martian moons. Among the reasons cited is the expense of sending a rocket into space with the amount of fuel necessary to complete the trip.
My own thought is:
Why are we still so attached to earth-launched vehicles? If we expect to expand our space program beyond Earth orbit, it's damn time we developed a self-propelled manned space craft that remains permanently in orbit.
If such a vessel were docked at the ISS when not on a mission I'd imagine it would substantially reduce the fuel requirements since you don't need to worry about escaping earth's atmosphere. That means more fuel that can be devoted to the mission. Also, IIRC, the majority of the fuel needed by the Apollo missions was, once again, to escape EARTH'S atmosphere. The rocket on the lunar modules didn't need anything near the same amount of power to jet back up to the command module after the surface mission was completed. You could then use "away modules" to jet down to the moon while the main ship remains in orbit in a similar fashion.
Different components could be assembles and tested on earth, then sent into space for assembly in a similar manner as the ISS.
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who ever said we stopped going to the moon in the first place,after all we only see the same side. For all we know the NSA or CIA could beup there alot
Because there are a LOT of amateurs and radio enthusiasts that keep track of every single rocket launch and shuttle mission that happens. :p The last "super secret satellite" that was launched was identified and had its purpose discovered within a few days.
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Aww, I liked that post.
Well I deleted it because mostly it was just a repeat of what I said earlier.After some thought thoughI realized that you were probably talking about the one part that was different from what I said earlier. The part where I said that it seems to becoming more obvious that if an area is capable of sustaining life it most likely already has it (or something to that extent).
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This looks promising for those wanting to go to Mars within the next 50 to 100 years...
DS4G ion engine
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/D/DS4G_ion_engine.html
:cool:
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:D Ghi beat me to it. IT was just a movie.... NASA admitts that they don't have any of the original tapes recordings of the "moon landing misssion" The destroyed them. It seems to me that they are the most important recording in history and they got rid of them. LOL
Besides all that explain how they got past the radiation belts without getting fried then IM a true bleliever.
Oh please pass the coolaid while your at it. :x
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I can't wait until the day we can go there ourselves...though by then all the non-believers may have died off.
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:D Ghi beat me to it. IT was just a movie.... NASA admitts that they don't have any of the original tapes recordings of the "moon landing misssion" The destroyed them. It seems to me that they are the most important recording in history and they got rid of them. LOL
Besides all that explain how they got past the radiation belts without getting fried then IM a true bleliever.
Oh please pass the coolaid while your at it. :x
Sounds like you're suffering from IDS...
This video may help you...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQphZnEpFdo&feature=player_embedded
:rofl
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:D Ghi beat me to it. IT was just a movie.... NASA admitts that they don't have any of the original tapes recordings of the "moon landing misssion" The destroyed them. It seems to me that they are the most important recording in history and they got rid of them. LOL
Besides all that explain how they got past the radiation belts without getting fried then IM a true bleliever.
Oh please pass the coolaid while your at it. :x
Who cares about the original Apollo 11 recordings? We landed on the moon 5 other times and there's plenty of footage there(of higher quality as well)
that do more than prove it actually happened.. Don't you think the Soviets at the time would've cried foul if they had any suspicion, especially at the height of the cold war?? The Soviets were keeping tabs on what was going on, monitoring voice, data and telemetry transmissions.. They would vouch (as many old guard Soviet Scientists already have) that this is a real thing and it actually happened and they listened and watched the entire thing..
As far as the Van Allen belts, they spent very little time going through the belts as compared to the rest of the mission and the exposure was minimal..
They also planned the flight path to go through the smallest area of the belt.
However, there are several Apollo era Astronauts who developed cataracts as a result of the dose of radiation they experienced....
People who question this stuff just don't look up the facts and just don't want to understand, regardless of their ability to comprehend the data..
But wait! The data is suspect due to the source(NASA)!! :noid
:lol
I've read many books extensively on the Apollo missions as well as some supporting the theory that it didn't really happen(just for a laugh)....
I know the most mundane and minuscule of facts from start to finish(and even into Skylab).. It's absurd to think it didn't really happen with all the
engineering, planning, and money that went into the program..
People who don't believe it just haven't done the research or haven't done enough research or truly don't comprehend any of the research in the first place..
People who cry "Moon Conspiracy" have a lot in common with these people -------> http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/ (http://www.theflatearthsociety.org/) :lol
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:D Ghi beat me to it. IT was just a movie.... NASA admitts that they don't have any of the original tapes recordings of the "moon landing misssion" The destroyed them. It seems to me that they are the most important recording in history and they got rid of them. LOL
Besides all that explain how they got past the radiation belts without getting fried then IM a true bleliever.
Oh please pass the coolaid while your at it. :x
I'm very glad that some people still believe that the Moon landings were faked. It gives me someone to laugh at when I get bored.
Also, they were in the 'radiation belts' (actually known as the Van Allen Belts) for about 4 hours each way. Not long enough to get 'fried', or even harmed. In addition, IF the Apollo astronauts would have been harmed by the Van Allen Belts, then there's NO WAY anyone could be living on the International Space Station.
EDIT: My bad, they only spent 30 minutes in the Van Allen Belt. They received radiation equivalent to a few hospital X-Rays.
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That's preposterous! :old:
There is no way the earth can be both flat and hollow. Therefore, it would have to be one or the other. :D
think pizza box.
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:D Ghi beat me to it. IT was just a movie.... NASA admitts that they don't have any of the original tapes recordings of the "moon landing misssion" The destroyed them. It seems to me that they are the most important recording in history and they got rid of them. LOL
Besides all that explain how they got past the radiation belts without getting fried then IM a true bleliever.
Oh please pass the coolaid while your at it. :x
"Moon Landing Mission"......**sigh**
By your quote, it seems you only think we landed on the moon once..... :rofl
While it may shock you to know this, there were also Apollo's 12-17.. We even had a spacestation made out of spare Apollo parts.. It was called Skylab.. (yes, I'm talking to you as if you ride the short bus to knitting class)..
Of course we all know what mostly happened with Apollo 13 thanks to Ron Howard..
What is your point in arguing this and spouting typical baseless conspiracy theory rhetoric when you truly don't know enough about the subject or the
the program in the first place or science for that matter? Amazing...
This goes for you too, Ghi...
Being a fellow Romanian does not exclude you... You know better... If not, I'll school you so you understand that this stuff actually happened....
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The moon has great advantages as a space station, instead of an orbital one. However, the greatest an immediate difficulty that we are facing is a better shuttle and launching capabilities into orbit. Shuttle in particular does not require lifting great loads (a few humans and equivalent weight in equipment) and can be achieved with existing or within-reach technology. With a base station in orbit or on the moon, the regular shuttling of humans back and forth will be required, without the need to transport all the life support, scientific equipment, building materials, etc. with them.
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The space station is only "GOOD" until about 2016,then it will be junked..They may possibly extend its life..But it just goes to show you just how HARSH space is on equipment.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/29/science/space/29shuttle.html
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guys come on you had to know i was funnin with you. :neener:
The only point you need to make to prove the moon landings is the fact that there are reflectors placed on the moon that we can fire lazer beams at to get a precise measurement of the distance to the moon. :neener:
Its called forensic evidence. if you want empirical evidence just go to one of the telescopes that have the ability and look through it.
Oh one more :neener: :neener: