Re: Nasa/faa

In fact, there is much to be said for mounting what I once dubbed a Big
Dumb Mars Landing, ruthlessly substituting brute force for expensive
cleverness at every step: off-the-shelf hardware, lots of redundancy,
plenty of spare parts, big crews with hands and tools rather than an
attempt at gleaming automated perfection. So what if it weighs 10_kt at
Earth departure? It still might be the cheapest way to do it.

A big dumb system will be incedibly expensive. The ISS is costing
$100e9 and rising a manned expedition to Mars probably about the same.
Thise who advocate spending money on this sort of scale had better have
a cast iron justification. The onlus is on them to prove their case.
Personally I do not think a credible case has been made for eirher.

The future of technology lies in automation and AI and on this basis
NASA is a 20th century dinosaur which is totally incapable of leading
us into the 21st.

Do we need leadership? Moot point - Commercial enterprises should pay
for themselves. Sky television pays the full cost of all their
launches. Should we simply have a scientific program led by scientific
organizations like NOAA.? There is a case -

1) For basic research whioch is valuable but no one else will pay for.
Standardization NBS, National Geological Survey and NOAA spring to
mind.

2) Government should enable interested paries to come together and do
research on topics like robotics.

All counties do this. Should NASA have Mega Projects? NO NO NO.

If you can aise the money by sponsorship and wish to go to Mars you
should be allowed to. If you can't you should not expect a government
to bankroll you Multi billion time.

.

Relevant Pages

  • In going to Mars, SOFTWARE property rights will play a key role!
    ... If the government had not protected these property ... Property rights is a key issue in going to Mars. ... should provide something far more valuable: recognition and protection ...
    (comp.databases.ms-access)
  • Re: Space Ship One and the X-Prise
    ... > be able to go on your subscription money. ... the goal of the government should be to support the ... > Orbital Logistics Solutions and go to Mars on the strength of that. ... And a couple of hundred million won't get any manned expedition ...
    (sci.space.policy)
  • Re: Generally hard
    ... >>>the Moon and Mars would be easily colonized, a unified World government ... >>Mars colonization. ... can you spare a spam filter?" ...
    (rec.arts.sf.written)
  • Re: OT: Drill baby drill!
    ... that money is not being loaded into a rocket and shot to Mars. ... hand, if you were to make the space program part of the military, you MIGHT ... Every time the government makes that decision for you, ...
    (rec.outdoors.rv-travel)
  • Re: The Case For Fossils On Mars
    ... >> I love my country, but one thing that I have always found disturbing is ... >> the fact that NASA and our government lies to the public. ... The common people deserve to know the truth about Mars, ...
    (sci.astro)