Microwave engine actually works, says NASA

[Sphere]

You won't find anyone more anti-ISS than me.

[Gaidin]

Why are we bothering with return on investment. NASA isn't about return on investment. NASA is about crazy ideas. NASA is a customer of engineering companies so they can go strange places and conduct strange experiments. They paid craptons of money to those companies so they could figure out how to fly to the moon, and do no more than bring rocks back. Yes, we got nifty little items out of it, but so what. That RoI wasn't the purpose of it. Forget the RoI. NASA is a customer, not a business.

[RubiconDecision]

Had we had these kinds of posts resulting in making final decisions in the Sixties, then we never would have gone to the Moon. Interesting though. One wonders if more posts will come about lots and lots of medical research, as failure is common. Of course more people would die if researchers had their budgets cut as they try crazy things like Tamoxifen from yew trees that actually ended up saving lives. So when I wonder would the personal computer revolution have happened without NASA's efforts to make it so?

[Gaidin]

Had we had these kinds of posts resulting in making final decisions in the Sixties, then we never would have gone to the Moon. Interesting though. One wonders if more posts will come about lots and lots of medical research, as failure is common. Of course more people would die if researchers had their budgets cut as they try crazy things like Tamoxifen from yew trees that actually ended up saving lives. So when I wonder would the personal computer revolution have happened without NASA's efforts to make it so?

That's my point. NASA needed a computer. They did something like going to a company like IBM and said 'we need a computer with these capabilities'. NASA was the customer. Sure, once they got that computer, they probably programmed it themselves. But plenty of companies designed the parts they needed, and THEY'RE the ones who made money off all this. One company in Kentucky even has a framed document saying that the part that went bad on Apollo 13 was not their fault, signed by the man who ran NASA at the time.

[RubiconDecision]

So Gaidin, the person in your sig is saying that we should fund NASA more, so the irony is hysterical. Are you proposing that space should only be the purview of Business? Wow. Or is your post saying that NASA should only be managing business in space like a funnel performs its task? Or what is that post driving towards? Unless NASA is empowered to act in Space, then I serious doubt 1000 companies will up and collaborate for space ventures. That sounds as implausible as spontaneous generation.

[Gaidin]

So Gaidin, the person in your sig is saying that we should fund NASA more, so the irony is hysterical. Are you proposing that space should only be the purview of Business? Wow. Or is your post saying that NASA should only be managing business in space like a funnel performs its task? Or what is that post driving towards? Unless NASA is empowered to act in Space, then I serious doubt 1000 companies will up and collaborate for space ventures. That sounds as implausible as spontaneous generation.

Hey, the sole purpose of the Apollo missions was to beat the Soviets to the moon. Not to make money. That was a mission. Not a business. I think that kind of inspiration is needed again for a further target again. Just pure mission. The want to get there just because it's there.

The little pieces that were handed to the common markets after? Coincidence.

NASA is research. NASA is not business and moneymaking.

[RubiconDecision]

Yep. I think NASA was possible because of patriotism and cohesion in America at a time when we were worried about the Soviet influence. Citizens need vision and purpose. Vision is underlying meaning. Purpose means goals. If we see no meaning and have no goals since we think there is no meaning (See the Nihilism debate), then people feel lost and rudderless. That's practically the state of America today.

So in that environment or milieu then you have a discovery about an exotic propulsion system that appear to have some credibility. And I suggested that we use the MITI (or METI) Japanese model of using NASA as a research wing that discovers something, and then passes it off to corporations to play with and improve upon so it's a commercial product. Did you read my post? It sounds a lot like what I was proposing except it's maybe not as jaded as your own post.

Americans are driven by vision, purpose, and money. The first two are the pinnacle of Maslow's Hierarchy of Need, and hence few people are focused upon it. That requires VISIONARIES to sell the idea to others who are mostly concerned about money and survival. This plays out throughout history for just about every time when things were dire, some visionary thought, "What if we do this instead?" and the idea was revolutionary, and people said, "It's too expensive. It won't pay for itself. There's no use because of blah blah." But others saw meaning and purpose and possibly money and did it anyway.

The creation of the Soviet Union
The Breakup of the Soviet Union and the Berlin Wall
Poland resisting the Soviet Union
The sea change in China's version of communism to a more capitalist model
NASA and the moon
Martin Luther and the Catholic Church
Gutenberg' Bible
The Japanese adoption of firearms
The Manhattan Project
ETC

That's the history of the world, right there. One person had a vision, and didn't listen to naysayers, and communicated it effectively until he/she gathered an impetus for change(conflict resolution and consensus building), and some tagged along since it might be profitable.

Watch Star Trek or really any space travel show. The whole catalyst for the show is warp drive. It changes everything. It's that much of a startling revolution in the same manner of the Theory of Evolution or Monotheism or the discovery of dynamite, etc.

[Gaidin]

So in that environment or milieu then you have a discovery about an exotic propulsion system that appear to have some credibility. And I suggested that we use the MITI (or METI) Japanese model of using NASA as a research wing that discovers something, and then passes it off to corporations to play with and improve upon so it's a commercial product. Did you read my post? It sounds a lot like what I was proposing except it's maybe not as jaded as your own post.

The problem here is that NASA is at the moment considering idea for a larger ship that you literally put together up there, at least at long term. That's obvious enough when you have a crazy idea like this floating around even at a pure research level. That doesn't do much good on an MITI concept because there's what, two companies in America that work with NASA even on a delivery to the ISS? And that's for take off and landing from ground? And like I said, many of these things that NASA uses for their space research were already developed and produced by private companies and delivered to NASA. Remember, like most government agencies, NASA works closely with engineering companies to develop what they need, not develop it themselves.

[Sphere]

Didn't see yew trees coming.

[Phier]

My thoughts on NASA spending...



If there is one place I don't mind crazy spending, its on space exploration. I say this realizing all the pitfalls and problems. Its like geek crack.

(No not the kind you find at Magic the Gathering meets)

[RubiconDecision]

http://useconomy.about.com/od/usfede...udget_cost.htm

How Does NASA's Cost Affect the Economy?

A report by the Space Foundation estimated that the space-related activities contributed $180 billion to the economy in 2005. More than 60% of this came from commercial goods and services created by companies related to space technology. The space economy includes commercial space products and services, commercial infrastructure and support industries, US government space budgets outside of NASA (such as Department of Defense, National Reconnaissance Office, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Energy, Federal Aviation administration, National Science Foundation, Federal Communications Commission, and United States Geological Survey), and non-US government space budgets.This means that each dollar of NASA spending is a catalyst for $10 of economic benefit.
That's because NASA is in a unique position to provide some of the technological innovation that drives the space economy. This created many of the goods and services we take for granted every day:

• Heart defibrillators
• GPS, which was developed by the Air Force for military applications
• Weather and communication satellites
• ATM, which provide an immediate electronic response via satellite.
• Other technologies developed for exploring space are now used to increase crop yields or search for good fishing regions.

A 2002 study by Professor H.R. Hertzfeld of George Washington University showed there is a large return to the companies work with NASA on its research contracts. These companies are able to commercialize the products developed and market them. The 15 companies studied received $1.5 billion in benefits from a NASA R&D investment of $64 million.

NASA's ROI Newsletter

[xcorps]

Had we had these kinds of posts resulting in making final decisions in the Sixties, then we never would have gone to the Moon.

So what?

We didn't go to the moon for any reason other than political capital. We didn't win any big prize for humanity. All we did was build a very expensive plane that took a handful of guys to a big rock.

The Apollo missions accomplished very little in comparison to say, the silicon chip or sliced bread. What exactly was the return? A handful of rocks. Esoteric knowledge. Parades for Neil, Buzz, and Collins. (How many people even know who Michael Collins is?)

And again, you can't point to any one thing that NASA hurried in it's development as a cause for space exploration because you can't vouch for the certain non existence of that thing if NASA didn't exist. It's a fallacy. Whenever I talk about ISS being a huge waste of money, people always say "Cancer Research" My response is always the same. Spend a billion more on cancer research and see if you don't get better results.

Oh, and if NASA had not killed Gus Grissom with their incompetence, he would have lived to build a trillion dollar corporation that discovered a way to teleport food to hungry people. So every child that goes to bed tonight with an empty tummy can thank NASA for that.

[Gaidin]

I'm not sure why people always say "cancer research" or some such anyway. Nasa is the place that has the effect on engineering and astronomy anyway...

[xcorps]

I'm not sure why people always say "cancer research" or some such anyway. Nasa is the place that has the effect on engineering and astronomy anyway...

A lot of could and should and maybes and possibly. Propaganda of the worst kind.

I'm all about studying space a la the Viking probes or Voyager or whatever. Failures are minimal, success is fruitful, and the cost really doesn't come hard to justify. Hell, Genesis crashed and scientists are still able to use the experiments; it was about a tenth the cost of a single manned launch.

[Magister Militum Flavius Aetius]

I'm all about studying space a la the Viking probes

[Campylobacter jejuni]

Hemp should never have been made illegal. It is a tremendously useful plant that we should be using for all sorts of things. The only reason it is illegal is because jackasses like William Randolph Hearst and his lumber lobby buddies started the propaganda campaign against hemp. There is no "might" either. Hemp is set to become a huge cash crop over next few decades as the stigma associated with smoking it disappears and new entrepreneurs find all sorts of uses for it. We should completely stop using trees for paper (which is extremely inefficient and non renewable really) and go to using hemp for paper since it yields at three times as much per acre and its renewable.

Now this is dreadfully off-topic, but hemp is not illegal. There are certain hemp species that are used for medications, others that are used for recreational drugs (yes, medical marihuana is not the same as stoner marihuana), and yet again others which are used for industrial applications. They are all treated differently. There very well are hemp species that are perfectly legal to grow.

[GrnEyedDvl]

We haven't lost sight. We've come to our senses. It's running NASA about $10k a pound to put something in LEO. It's about $25k per pound for a moon landing. Just to put something ON the moon intact, not actually have it do anything.


At current costs, any constructions in space or on the moon are completely fruitless and a waste of time, energy and resources. When things get to the 25-50 dollar a pound price range, then we start talking about constructions.

If we ever get to the point that we can mine asteroids in space and use the raw materials there for finished products, then we will be way ahead of the game in terms of costs. But we cant get to that point without spending a PILE of money first. Unfortunately they are spending the money watching seeds grow.

[Magister Militum Flavius Aetius]

If we ever get to the point that we can mine asteroids in space and use the raw materials there for finished products, then we will be way ahead of the game in terms of costs. But we cant get to that point without spending a PILE of money first. Unfortunately they are spending the money watching seeds grow.

Quite literally.