Posted on 09/24/2007 10:41:14 AM PDT by Names Ash Housewares
NASA aims to put a man on Mars by 2037, the administrator of the US space agency indicated here Monday. This year marks the half-century of the space age ushered in by the October 1957 launch of the Sputnik-1 by the then Soviet Union, NASA administrator Michael Griffin noted.
In 2057, the centenary of the space era, "we should be celebrating 20 years of man on Mars," Griffin told an international astronautics congress in this southern Indian city where he outlined NASA's future goals.
The international space station being built in orbit and targeted for completion by 2010 would provide a "toehold in space" from where humanity can travel first to the moon and then to Mars, Griffin said.
"We are looking at the moon and Mars to build a civilisation for tomorrow and after that," Griffin added in his remarks at a conference session attended by heads of the world's space agencies.
President George W. Bush in 2004 announced an ambitious plan for the US to return to the moon by 2020 and use it as a stepping stone for manned missions to Mars and beyond.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Maybe we should cut some corners, i.e., skip the Moon.
Might have happened if the Russians had stayed in the race. They pulled out and Congress followed suit.
Not to mention nuclear power.
Hillary! might well do that, but the space program originates in Congress not the Oval Office. JFK’s moon landing was Congress’ program. The Pres often enough enthusiastically favors whatever Congress wants to fund, and that would work for Hillary! as much as anyone.
A lot of people have trouble understnading that the same is true of evolution.
I thought that it would be earlier as well. I read all those Sci Fi books in the 60s and believed them too much. I suppose some want to P-— away our resources here on Earth with more socialistic programs instead of Scientific exploration.
Really? Could you point me to the experiment where evolution was predicted, tested, and results repeated?
We could, easily, with the financial commitment. But that commitment is not there. So with a smaller annual budget, its going to take longer to accomplish.
Yes, but you wouldn't understand it, and it would take quite a lot of explanation, so I won't bother.
Really? Its a predictable, repeatable, experiment concerning a fundamental theory of science, and someone with a Master's degree wouldn't be able to understand it?
Hmmm, sounds fishy.
“intelligent life elsewhere”
Reminds me of a sketch from “That Was The Week That Was” when President Charles DeGaulle was boasting of his own nuclear arsenal and taunting the U.S. and Soviets over the race to put a man on the moon.
The sketch featured `Madame Charles DeGaulle’ announcing that France was bypassing the race for the moon and intended to be the first to put a manned probe on the planet Mars. When the interviewer asked why, she replied,
“Because if there is intelligent life on Mars, it will speak FRENCH, of course!”
;^)
Frankly, I despise you naysayers who say that terraforming Mars isn’t practical just because it would take a billion years and would require many more times more money than the combined wealth of every human being on earth, and even then would probably not be possible.
Hah, that’s what you think, just let the democrats find a single uncommitted voter on mars and we’d be there in two years.
Thirty years?
Why so long? It took far less time go go from prop driven airplanes to the moon. Of course we took chances and things were dangerous.
What liberal driven safety equipment in quadruple redundant systems will be required for the Mars trip?
Whatever nation controls space controls the world. They have the capacity to dictate terms since they can attack anyone with impunity by lobbing asteroids or rocks down onto targets on earth (gravity and physics does the work). Their enemies can’t touch them since there aren’t any systems that can (1) destroy incoming meteor bombs (2) HIT incoming meteor bombs from above LEO.
For example, a 10-meter diameter rock just KICKED into a descent by a small rocket will hit the earth at no less than 8.0-11.5 kps, giving an impact of anywhere from 20,000-60,000 tons of TNT (depending on mass) or 1-3 times the bomb that was dropped on Hiroshima. Double the mass or velocity; quadruple the impact force. Even a direct hit by a nonnuclear antibalistic system won’t deflect or destroy such a massive kinetic object.
What about protecting home nations? Easy. Space-based ballistic missile defense platforms parked around and above the border can destroy ballistic missiles while they’re still in the boost phase, dropping the radioactive materials back onto the attacking nation. Thus, an enemy can only resort to systems that do not leave the atmosphere, which are a lot slower, and much easier to destroy with a good defensive system.
Heck, a single rail gun or EM gun on the moon can bring every nation on earth to its knees (yes, this includes the US) by firing ROCKS towards targets on earth. NOTHING on earth will be able to prevent it from destroying whatever target it wants. People will be screaming at their political and military leaders to surrender when entire cities are turned into craters.
No, trust me on this - whoever controls space controls the world.
A "Master's degree" in what?
Here's a simple genetics test question:
Most people have heard that recessive traits are "bad" (harmful to an organism). Do you know whether there is any truth to this, and why?
“Private ventures don’t tend to make absurdly high risks (like a flight to Mars) for absolutely zero material gain.”
Ah, but we don’t know that, do we? Corporations spend BILLIONS in exploration every year in the HOPES of discovering something valuable. After all, Mars has a surface area nearly as large as all of earth’s continents put together. For all we know, there are things worth TRILLIONS just laying on the Martian surface.
The wonderful thing about causal elements of evolutionary theory are that they are what ever you want them to be, as long as the theorized outcome is what is standing in front of you.
Are recessive traits "bad"? Nothing is bad in evolution that doesn't prohibit reproduction. Indeed, currently unused even negative traits can be said to be a positive, since they provide options in the event of environmental change. Thus allowing recessive to become dominant.
But as I said, the beauty of all causal theory is that its 20/20 hindsight. The trait exists, therefore it can't be too negative, and because we accept evolutionary pressure as the impetus for all existing traits, we must therefore accept that all existing traits have an evolutionary roll. Its really quite circular and a bit too convenient to pass for good science.
Biologists shouldn't concern themselves so much with causal theories, no matter how fun they are, because they are ultimately conjecture.
If there is ever anything that makes the theory of evolution look bad, it is some paleontologist speaking with authority about why a creature developed a fin or a trunk.
In short, there is no more reason to think that giraffes lengthened their necks to forage higher, than there is to think that their necks just got longer and it didn't prove to be an eliminating trait.
There’s alot to be learned by sending a man all the way to mars and back and keep him alive the whole time.
Close, actually a "bad" genetic trait is one which makes reproduction less likely.
Recessive traits do not become dominant. Mutations create new traits, some will be recessive and some dominant, some will be "bad" and some "good".
Some "good" and "bad" traits are only "good" or "bad" in a given environment. Many "bad" traits make reproduction much less likely regardless of environment.
If such a "bad" trait is recessive, it will only be expressed if it is reinforced by a matching trait from the other parent. If the "bad" trait is dominant, it will be expressed regardless of the trait inherited from the other parent.
If a strongly "bad" trait is always expressed, it is quickly weeded out of the gene pool. Only when these traits are recessive, can they "hide", to pop up from time to time as they are reinforced. The result is that most "bad" traits, which continue in a gene pool for many generations, are recessive.
This, by the way, is one of the simplest predictions and reproducible experiments of evolution.
The problem that most people have, in understanding evolution, is that they are simply not good enough at math. Of course, many also have beliefs that would prevent them from understanding it, even if they did understand the math.
The laws of mathematics predict everything that we know about evolution, just as surely as they do with common games of chance.
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