Bush: Lost in Space? (Barf)

I can't believe it. I guess now I'll have to vote for Bush in the upcoming elections...Not what I expected, but after reading this report where he evinces strong support for the space program, I've had to switch alliances. As many of you know, I'm a big fan of science fiction, but I don't want to live out my life just reading about space--I'd like to go there, and perhaps teach there!

However, as usual, Bush is a bit muddled in his plans. Fans of Ben Bova or Bob Zubrin Mars Society Founder know that a moonbase is an unnecessary, resulting in little more than an economic sinkhole. In fact, it'd be cheaper to construct a space station orbiting the moon and shuttle astronauts back and forth to the lunar surface than to construct a moon base. There is no water on the moon; I read somewhere that if you were living on the moon, you'd be trying to squeeze water from concrete. Plus, don't plan on going out to your mailbox in your bathrobe; you'll never be separated from your pressurized space suit.

That said, there are some benefits we could reap from the moon, the most important being all those tons of cosmic sediment that have settled across its surface for the last billion years or so. The surface has been pelted with meteorites which contain precious, hard-to-find elements (and possibly even some as-yet undiscovered elements). These same met rocks fall to earth, of course, but our atmosphere burns them to less than a cinder.

Man that's a hard font to read on that site. Let me just put the full article here:

I can't believe it. I guess now I'll have to vote for Bush in the upcoming elections...Not what I expected, but after reading this report where he evinces strong support for the space program, I've had to switch alliances. As many of you know, I'm a big fan of science fiction, but I don't want to live out my life just reading about space--I'd like to go there, and perhaps teach there!

However, as usual, Bush is a bit muddled in his plans. Fans of Ben Bova or Bob Zubrin Mars Society Founder know that a moonbase is an unnecessary, resulting in little more than an economic sinkhole. In fact, it'd be cheaper to construct a space station orbiting the moon and shuttle astronauts back and forth to the lunar surface than to construct a moon base. There is no water on the moon; I read somewhere that if you were living on the moon, you'd be trying to squeeze water from concrete. Plus, don't plan on going out to your mailbox in your bathrobe; you'll never be separated from your pressurized space suit.

That said, there are some benefits we could reap from the moon, the most important being all those tons of cosmic sediment that have settled across its surface for the last billion years or so. The surface has been pelted with meteorites which contain precious, hard-to-find elements (and possibly even some as-yet undiscovered elements). These same met rocks fall to earth, of course, but our atmosphere burns them to less than a cinder.

A better plan by far is to skip the moon altogether and go straight to Mars. As any reader of this stuff knows, Mars is the only planet (well, there may be a moon or two about Jupiter) that shows any promise of supporting human life. Though some scientists argue the point, most agree that there is water or water ice on Mars, some positing that massive amounts of water exists deep underground. Water, of course, is the key to supporting human life. Theoretically, given enough time and effort, Mars' atmosphere could be changed enough by the introduction of simple plant life to let humans take off their spacesuits, though the air would probably be much thinner than that found at the top of Mt. Everest.

Anyway, flawed as it is, I'm just glad that our president has taken some interest in the future. To me, the future is space exploration, and I will subscribe to the imperialistic conceit that it is our destiny to colonize the planets and reap enormous benefits from their natural resources. Even though ol' Dubya is undoubtedly doing this precisely to split the intellectual vote, I'm buying.

I don't understand why Zubrin wants to skip the moon. To me, going to mars without some kind of space infrastructure (space elevator, moon L1 station, GEO station, moon base, mass driver, anything to get lots of mass into space and organize it) sounds like one BIG rocket to me. The astronauts probably wouldn't get a pseudo-gravity, rotating torus either. Which is really not cool when your going to spend 6 months in no gravity, a year in low gravity and another 6 months in no gravity. Without some kind of centrifuge, they might be crippled when they get back. Also, you need a lot of radiation protection, which is a lot of mass. Also, it would have to be a small crew, probably not more than NASA's current 7, which is not good psychologically especially when communications take at least several minutes, and you won't be home for 2 years. I'd feel pretty isolated.

And one great thing about the moon: You can always look up, and see that beautiful earth. Right there. Like you could nearly touch it. That, for me, would be one of the greatest draws of space flight. And its only a few days away if something goes bad.

Hm, when I think about this stuff, I convince myself more and more that our first Mars shot will only happen once we have some serious experience between here and the moon. And a second Mars shot is only worth your time if you plan to start a colony.

I am not the one to speak about moon base projects although I have been to open houses at NASA a number of times and seen different projects that were being worked on.

I've also talked with moon walker astronauts who favored Moon and Mars projects over the space station.

Some of this would take a LONG time to implement but things have to get started someplace. Let's hope things can get underway while there is still some work ethic and promotion based on merit.

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