Re: Deep Impact Kicks Off Fourth of July with Deep Space Fireworks

spinoza1111@xxxxxxxxx wrote:


: Eric Chomko wrote:
: > spinoza1111@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
: >
: >
: > : Eric Chomko wrote:
: > : > spinoza1111@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
: > : >
: > : >
: > : > : Joe Strout wrote:
: > : > : > In article <42dcb390.80743252@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
: > : > : > simberg.interglobal@xxxxxxxxx (Rand Simberg) wrote:
: > : > : >
: > : > : > > >The problem being we don't know how to prevent an Earth strike. Recent
: > : > : > > >research has discovered that the Bruce Willis prevention
: > : > : > >
: > : > : > > Yes, we do, as long as we aren't so ignorant as to think that
: > : > : > > Hollywood is a useful guide as to methods by which to do so.
: > : > : > >
: > : > : > > <rest of ignorance of orbital mechanics snipped>
: > : > : >
: > : > : > But Rand, you snipped the best part:
: > : > : >
: > : > : > > ...could very well make one Earth strike into many Earth and
: > : > : > > Moon strikes, where the latter through tidal effects could have further
: > : > : > > bad effects.
: > : > : >
: > : > : > Hee hee! It's good to start the day with a laugh.
: > : >
: > : > : Especially if the rest of the day you spread cheek to people who think
: > : > : like a manager and not an engineer. OK, a Moon strike would not change
: > : > : the tides. As a layman who pays your goddamn salary, I find this a
: > : > : surprise and I await your answer, for that is what usenet is for.
: > : >
: > : > Allow me. You need to get a better understanding how little there is in
: >
: > : Excuse me. I have been well aware since university and before how far
: > : apart planets are, and to a lesser extent. asteroids.
: >
: > : Unfortunately, you are projecting a complex three-dimensional system,
: > : that includes unknown subplanetary objects, onto a simplistic linear
: > : scale.
: >
: > No, a simple euclidean scale, or even a Newtonian one which lacks
: > Einsteins gravitational warps or bends.

: ...in which IF you haven't inventoried all subplanetary objects THEN
: you have...nondeterminism.

Your implication about Deep Impact is that we've somehow decreased our
chances of survival by sending a probe into comet. The notion is false on
its face!

: >
: > : Even if planets and to a lesser extent asteroids are far apart,
: > : interactions over time (whether aeons or shorter periods) can increase
: > : the probability of an event causing an event that affects humanity.
: >
: > The point is that what was done with Tempel 1 could be argued to be either
: > good OR bad, equally WRT its impact on the earth. IOW, the chances are so
: > small that ANYTHING will occur of it WRT the earth, that the assessment of
: > good or bad become equal due to their probability being very very small of
: > having any effect.

: Probability good: 10e-5: probability bad 10e-4. Probability diff: order
: of magnitude. Hmm, big difference in terms of the inputs.

It is probably closer to 10e-25 and 10e-26, though you are correct about
the order of magnitude.

: But, I admit that the probability of the OR statement is low.

Low enough to not really discuss other than in purely philosphical terms.

: But you haven't at all understood, less come to grips with, the need
: for a decision prior to the math, which is whether we need to treat
: deep space with Hippocratic reverence and "above all do no harm".

As another poster stated, you falsely attribute biological status to a
comet, whereas it is much more like a rock or mountain that we'd break
in order to carve a road or create a tunnel through, for transportation
purposes. In this case we broke it open to see what was inside like a
geologist does with a rock.

: I am getting real tired of your evasion while others make stupid
: remarks about prose style.

Nobody is evading anything. You simply don't get that science, like
cooking, requires a few eggs to be broken.

: If it is an axiom (and you are free to demur as long as you accept the
: consequences of demurral) that IF a system is complex and partly
: unknown THEN we need to take the Hippocratic oath and "above all do no
: harm", THEN the possibility of benefit is moot.

Well then you should think that leaving our man-made objects on the moon
as part of the Apollo Project as litter.

: We don't approve of the doctor who does an operation which MIGHT create
: sexual potency or cure baldness when that operation MIGHT also harm. I
: realize that in the immoral free market of American medicine, rich
: patients might believe that they can demand such operations, but this
: only means that being a stupid idiot without moral seriousness is
: widespread in American life.

The fallacy in your argument continues to be assigning biological status
to a comet. We didn't wound the thing!

: > : Ethically, even if the probability of Deep Impact causing through
: > : indirect effects an Earth event is 10e-100, IF the event happened in a
: > : space and time continuum with all the *raum undt zeit* in the world to
: > : produce "unlikely" events, the authors of the destructive and macho
: > : Deep Impact stunt would still bear an unbearable ethical responsibility
: > : which they could have avoided by adopting my view, that as a complex
: > : system space should be treated under a Hippocratic oath, above all, do
: > : no harm.
: >
: > Again, based upon your scenario, the folks the tiggered Deep Impact could
: > have saved humanity as well by avoiding an imminent strike of the earth by
: > Tempel 1. My agrument is just as valid as yours!
: >
: Nope. They had no such intent. Instead, they had at best the intent to
: help, not save, humanity by getting information. Mixed with careerism,
: of course.

....and science. We REALLY do want to know what is under the surface!

: But it's clear you don't accept my radical thesis, that BECAUSE space
: is while deterministic in the large not in fact fully known even in the
: Solar System, we need to "above all do no harm".

Do you believe Voyager or any probe for that matter wasn't/isn't
potentially harmful by it very nature of being in space?

: What this means is you are prepared without moral seriousness to cause
: harm on the scale of Columbus and the early Western explorers: they
: caused depopulation of the American continent through disease, because
: their "harm", the violation of either property rights or a commons,
: caused diseases through a process they were too dumb to know about.

But no one would argue that discovering the New World wasn't the greater
good. You are arguing for the lesser good and won't win it, other than on
a case by case basis. And I doubt anyone would call Tempel 1 a blow to
humanity because a few pieces of rock were blown off of it! In fact, you
could very well be negligent with your time arguing over such a low
probablistic outcome in the face of REAL issues! Now that puts me into the
same boat so I must show you the err of your ways! You did it now...

: The alternative to the Columbian expedition, which was mercantilist and
: therefore economically senseless, wasn't staying at home like a doofus.
: It was instead WHAT WAS ALREADY HAPPENING, which were laissez-faire
: voyages of trade whose scale restricted their biological impact, and
: which by being gradual and step by step would have prevented, probably,
: the impact of disease.

To this day with global trade, introduced species, such as those from
China into the San Francisco Bay, occur regularly. Why to you mention
Columbus when it is an issue today?

: > : Treat it in other words with reverence.
: >
: > ...unless they are headed for your home. It is the same as I treat people.
: > With respect, except when they try to break into my home and/or hurt my
: > family or me.
: >
: Oh Jesus, here it comes...yeah, yeah, yeah...

A Beatle, you ain't...

: > : Furthermore, if techs on the current Shuttle launch cannot get as
: > : required all four sensor systems working, if the current launch fails
: > : to meet a major requirement of the 2003 investigation, then resources
: > : should be focused on the Shuttle.
: >
: > The shuttle is Johnson Space Center and Deep Impact is Jet Propulsion
: > Laboratory. YOU tell the scientists and engineers at JPL that their work
: > and jobs have been cut and sent to JSC in Houston for the shuttle.

: Don't fucking gerrymander the issue. Public space policy, as Diane
: Vaughan showed, is unitary and top-down. JPL and Johnson are part of
: the same phenom.

Yes, and no! They are part of NASA but each is in a different state.

: > And after you do that, do the same thing with the Army and Navy because
: > you want more for the Air Force. I dare you!
: >
: > Wait, let's identify your job and reallocate the money elsewhere for the
: > better good.
: >
: > You might want to reread your namesake or maybe read up on Nietzsche or
: > something?

: Spinoza's knowledge was by definition noninvasive because it was the
: shareable and nonproprietary part of experience. Note that ONE "deep
: impact" means that subsequently we cannot perform the same operation on
: the same comet with better tools whether invasive or noninvasive.
: Whereas a Hubble observation is repeatable.

We can send a probe to another comet. Actually Tempel 1, being a periodic,
could actually be hit again.

: Any time we choose to destroy in order to know, we make the decision
: that our instruments are optimal and won't improve.

Was Tempel 1 destroyed? Who knew?

: However, today, JPL and Johnson both are constrained by omnipresent
: funding pressures (created by overinvestment in military foolishness
: and the exit of the rich from the tax base) to "race" to destructive
: ventures with existing technology.

Don't ovrestimate how much NASA and the DOD overlap.

: No account is taken of the fact that IF you delay a launch or other
: stunt, your engineers can work not only on the questionable system but
: all other systems.

: The work of the engineers is in the current way of doing things not
: properly accounted for as an asset, in my view.

: My view is that if a guy has a degree from Princeton in aeronautics and
: is not some hophead or drunk, he will show up with his slide rule, or
: Blackberry, and generate most days fragments of real human knowledge
: even if nobody asks him.

Good, it would appear that you are a manager Y in the manager X and
manager Y theory of management. I.e. you don't feel that you must kick
your workers to make them productive. YOU might put them to sleep,
however...

: This is what geeks like to do. For example, in slack time as a
: programmer, I have always worked on acquiring new skills by creating
: tools for my own use, and one result was that in May 2004 I published a
: rather straightforward, if rather droll, book on compiler
: development...with a 26000-line compiler based on a set of tools for
: string handling and math, versions of which I'd developed for
: employers.

: <shamelessPlug>Buy my book I need the money it is Build Your Own .Net
: Language and Compiler, Apress 2004 (I wanted to call it Build Your Own
: Goddamn .Net Language and Compiler but Apress would not let
: me).</shamelessPlug>

As someone in your field, I will check it. I just hope is isn't another
Reextensive Markup Language(TM).

I suspect that the subtitle has something to with with bridging the gap
between the way managers think as compared to the way engineers think.
Now, if you can convince Scott Adams, of 'Dilbert' fame, to buy into your
work, then you might actually become famous!

: However, the current top-down accounting system by focusing on the
: "needs" of the administration effectively assigns zero or negative
: value to unfocused efforts.

Thus, the need for metadata...

: The result is that the operational types need to overfocus on the parts
: of the system identified by management as critical.

Yes, like KLOC from IBM, when Microsoft was rewarding its programmers for
actually removing lines of code to make them do the same thing faster and
more efficiently.

: Subsequently, crises occur because of a lack of continuous effort on
: disfavored subsystems. For example, by 2003, the "system" for recording
: the launch visually was a black and white camera (in an era when
: parents can for a few hundred dollars buy a camera to record their
: baby's drooling in real time).

You seem to forget that most 'stop' signs turned into traffic lights were
the result of several accidents and even some deaths.

: That story of the black and white camera registers an astonishing
: passivity extending to passive aggression, because it appears from the
: record that by 2003 to many decent engineers had been bitch-slapped for
: asking questions about quality issues not on the agenda...in a culture
: of cost-cutting.

Left over from the faster, better, cheaper era.

: Iraq makes clear that members of the military-industrial complex use
: procurement to enrich themselves and their fat pals. Therefore, the
: replacement of the outdated camera couldn't use a simple commercial
: product. The paperwork of procurement, rigged at NASA to favor known
: companies, becomes part of "engineering" in a culture where
: "engineering" is no longer the application of science, but also
: manipulation of requirements and expectations.

I was hoping that NASA would influence the DOD rather than the other way
around.

: As a result, prior to the 2003 event, engineers could not form a clear
: idea of how insulation struck the wing and the pattern of chunks that
: did so.

No more than when certain stop signs get run which cause accidents.

: Here, the layperson's, the taxpayer's, and Ted Kennedy's
: pre-liquid-lunch perceptions might have a validity lacking in NASA, in
: JPL. Basically, it appears in layman's terms that by 2003 we were
: firing a high-tech garbage can into space and as we did so, it was
: falling apart.

But why do you pick on JPL for that? They are deep space and did quite
well after the Mars failures of a decade ago with the success of Spirit
and Oppurtunity.

: I mean, come on. If my car's tailpipe falls off, I delay the launch.
: But in the 2003 launch, pieces of the shuttle were falling off and
: engineers were through lack of the older privilege of "pushback" to
: stop the launch.

I believe the piece of foam falling off was after or during liftoff and
not before.

Eric
.

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