NASA was born from an entirely different generation. Today in this generation of Power-Point engineers & scientists coming out of degree-mill universities with low academic standards, you need ask the question: “Can we do it again?”.
With most of the Apollo blue-prints in need of reverse engineering, budget cuts, it is remarkable anything substantial can be accomplished. But it does. There are many competent engineers & scientists up for the opportunities that lay ahead.
Three NASA pillars remain: Up-lookers (extrasolar), Down-lookers (terrestrial) & Education. But NASA is still in a search of a mission statement that will re-vitalize it from it’s previous vision.
Those that think commercialization is the way to go, are guessing that this will be an enabling method. They are partially if not completely incorrect. Corporations can take short term risks, sometimes with billions involved. But unless they can sustain these levels of expenditure, they are doomed to failure.
Commercialization of space can only be accomplished if we can develop a means of going beyond Earth orbit that is significantly cheaper than $20K per pound of payload.
Therefor, if NASA is to progress under a currently dwindling budget, resources & manpower, it is necessary to focus it’s attention more towards “non chemical” propulsion system solutions.
It will be a hard pill to swallow, because of all of the infrastructure already in place. It was proven to Dr. Vonn Braun many years ago that NASA cannot sustain it’s budget indefinitely. Making NASA “Pay for itself” cannot get there if getting beyond Earth’s orbit costs 20K, 10K, or even 1K per pound.
Warp drive is a fantasy. But we need to invest in a practical means of inexpensive propulsion, making space flight cost effective. When an inexpensive means of propulsion is attainable, the private sector will be less at risk and therefor more of an attainable concept.
One of Dr. Von Braun’s memorial quote’s, encapsulates marching orders needed to succeed: “Research is something I do, when I do not know what I’m doing”. Thus we need to invest in research that will enable more of a solution set towards inexpensive space travel, rather than sending balloons to Mars! Easier said than done. NASA’s earlier mantra is in need of further exploration back to it’s Apollo roots: “We do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard...”.
This is my opinion, and not of NASA’s.
Corporations will find ways of making it cheaper and ways of making it pay off. That is a totally different motivation than NASA.
Warp drive is a fantasy. But we need to invest in a practical means of inexpensive propulsion, making space flight cost effective. When an inexpensive means of propulsion is attainable, the private sector will be less at risk and therefor more of an attainable concept.
Launch costs aren't high because we need "an inexpensive means of propulsion." SpaceX vehicles have lox/kerosene gas generator engines. Falcon Heavy, which should fly in a couple years, will be a thousand dollars a pound. Falcon 9, which just flew to ISS, is about $2500.
Got some news for you -- space is already "commercialized." Where do you think DirecTV comes from? Or global telephone calls? We've been making money from space applications since 1962.
The idea that some new magic space transportation system will come along is pure fantasy -- such requires not new engineering, but new physics. Simply because of the magnitude of Earth's gravity and the rocket equation, we're stuck with rockets for the foreseeable future, at least to get from Earth's surface to low Earth orbit. And basically, those cost numbers (dollars per pound to LEO) may come down a factor of two or three or four, but not by an order of magnitude.
Making NASA “Pay for itself” cannot get there if getting beyond Earth’s orbit costs 20K, 10K, or even 1K per pound.
It's getting to Earth orbit that's the problem, not "beyond" it. NASA could be made to "pay for itself" -- it doesn't require financial break-even, only that its returned value is perceived to be higher than the money spent on it. Thus, it should focus on creating value for tax dollar spent, not conducting public relations stunt missions, such as astronauts to asteroids.