Re: Space becomes routine.

From: Ian Woollard (junkmail_at_wolfkeeper.plus.com)
Date: 07/05/04 

Date: 5 Jul 2004 14:48:31 -0700

"curlyQlink" <paulfxfoley@earthlink.net> wrote in message news:<WpcGc.8797$yy1.667@newsread2.news.atl.earthlink.net>...
> "Ian Woollard" <junkmail@wolfkeeper.plus.com> wrote in message
> news:Zb3Gc.3197$Fc7.561127@stones.force9.net...
> >
> > It's a status symbol. And people love zero-g; they love looking back at
> > the earth and so forth. Everyone who has been up there said it was a
> > blast. People *will* and have paid to go.
>
> The experience of weightlessness, as I understand it, is the sensation of
> falling: an unpleasant, nausea-inducing state. And I really wouldn't expect
> an astronaut, whose career is pegged to NASA's success, to say of his long
> awaited ride in space that "it sucked."

Why not? Many of them have retired. Not a single one has said anything
remotely like that.

> We're hardly dealing here with objective observers of the experience.

Sure, they wanted to be there; and spent decades getting to be there.
That should tell you something too.

> Want thrills? Want to throw up? Go skydiving. It's safer, and doesn't
> cost a literal fortune.

Funny, I don't think skydivers throw up much.

> Manned spaceflight has no commercial potential. There is no real market,
> and the costs are far too high.

There is a real market already, as Soyuz has shown.

Are you really claiming that if it cost, say, $10,000 to put a person
into space, and with 99.99% reliability, that an insignificant number
of space tourists would go? Because that seems to be a plausible price
and reliability that might be ultimately achievable.

> You might as well make the argument that we could all be driving
> Ferraris if they'd just make more of 'em and drive the price down.

A reasonably good analogy. The price of Ferraris is kept artificially
high to keep them exclusive. Mass production would indeed reduce the
price very significantly. Of course Ferrari aren't about to do that.
Similarly, NASA does not want cheap spaceflight.

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