Can I ask someone to rebuttal my argument against human space flight?

[Ken Fabian]

Most people, when they really think about it aren't as pro-Utopian, as pro-entropy in an enclosed space / system / world, as pro-death , as some anti-Frontier universe types are.

That sounds like Lead Us To The Promised Land style religio-prophetic rhetoric to me, with the unbelievers being chastised for their lack of faith. And set up to be scapegoats to blame when the prophecies don't work out.

Humanity does live in an enclosed space/system/world for the foreseeable future and the health of this world is essential to the continuing technological advancements that might make space colonisation achievable. I don't see my doubts that colonising space is achievable without extraordinary technological advances as "pro-death" or that I am anti-frontier, just realistic about what is achievable and opposed to wasteful expenditures based on overhyped and unrealistic expectations.

There are good Earth based goals and reasons to advance space technology, including very ambitious ones, such as meteorite defense that could be widely supported despite no innate profitability. Asteroid minerals for Earth use have commercial potential, although we appear way short of being able to do so, but if it can be done I don't doubt there will be large scale investment.

As I see it further advances is space tech do not depend on grand long term goals like colonising space but if the tech that can support them does emerge there won't be a shortage of interest.

I think making human colonisation of space a high priority is premature. I think if it happens it will be an emergent outcome of activities in space for other more pragmatic reasons and getting ahead of ourselves won't make it happen sooner.

 

[Pogo]

I just don’t see mining anywhere being cost effective, what with the cost of launching not much of anything into LEO, let alone getting substantial equipment, people, etc to some asteroid. Then there’s how to get this stuff back to Earth, and then landing it somewhere. Crash it in the ocean, you’ll lose it; crash it on land . . . Well, no comment needed.

 

[Ken Fabian]

I just don’t see mining anywhere being cost effective, what with the cost of launching not much of anything into LEO, let alone getting substantial equipment, people, etc to some asteroid.

Asteroid mining is something with commercial opportunities to aim for.

Nothing apart from Near Earth for uses with Earth based customers is cost effective in space and the ones that are income positive without taxpayer support don't include people. Nothing blows out the costs like including people. Worse for colony attempts than asteroid mining, which at least has material commodities of high value in great abundance to repay the investments.

If we can't do asteroid mining for PGM rich taenite nickel-iron that is worth above US$10's of thousands per ton raw and unrefined just for the nickel then colony attempts that have no financial return are a non-starter. And nickel-iron, especially the nickel rich varieties, are where the Platinum Group Metals are, at 10's of ppm, up to (going by some meteorites) 100ppm - ie up to 100g per ton.

Dropping ingots on remote land safely is probably doable. My point is it has - if only potentially - a commercial basis, which is a requirement for attracting necessary investment.

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

Hello, would someone be interested in providing arguments defending human spaceflight vs unmanned spaceflight? I'm on team unmanned. I'm leaving out difficult questions like cost and danger since these are hard to base arguments around. These are just some arguments I hear companies like NASA and SPACEX use over and over that I really want to pick into.

Argument 1: It provides the necessary PR and funding for more critical scientific mission like cassini and new horizon.
Counter 1: Lower launch cost in the future will negate high funding cost, thus negating the need for PR stunts involving humans.

Argument 2: Lot of spin-off technologies are developed in R&D like velcro
Counter 2: These technologies weren't developed by NASA, and even where they were, they do not outway the cost, and might have developed on their own. (This is a weak defense on my part since it relies on speculation)

Argument 3: Human are required for time critical task that require improvisation.
Counter 3: What time sensitive task? (This one I hear a lot, I'm not sure as to what they're getting at. If you know, could you explain it to me?)

Argument 4: Humans can improvise in the moment where machine can only use the tools it's equipped with.
Counter 4: Humans are also limited to the tools they have at hand. It also much easier just to send a second probe.

If you have more arguments for or against human spaceflight, please let me know. You can provide your own counters and counter my counters.

Ok I of course will concede that I am on the manned (human) spaceflight side of it and that my answer is simplistic. But we all know what Occam's razor has to say about that.

Knowledge for the sake of knowledge in the end eventuality become pointless. If man's destiny is to survive right here on earth until the end of the Universe itself?

Then ...when that does happens ...who will be around to care what humankind learned or didn't learn? You can't say that humans themselves will care because there will be nobody to ask.

 

[billslugg]

We should insure the survival of the human race right up until the universe ends. At that point we should ask for an extension. Only by the search for knowledge for the sake of knowledge will we learn the secrets needed. However, right now is a real bad time to be spending resources for the sake of knowledge. We need to focus our resources. The reason is because the world is on fire in, like, about 3 or 4 different ways. We need to learn very quickly how to not trash our planet. Crewed spaceflight outside the Earth-Moon system won't be needed for about a billion years when we must move to another planet. Meanwhile, any attempt to establish a Mars colony is only helping to insure our demise.

 

[LKK]

The official line is of course that "boots on the ground" yield far more poductivity than current robots.
To myself the real value of the grand adventure into space is , well, the grand adventure itself. It touches the souls of many of us, what's more important than that?

 

[billslugg]

The assertion that crewed travel to Mar's surface is needed because "boots on the ground yield far more productivity" is not accompanied by a good reason. It is being done for the glory, as you say.

 

[LKK]

A difference between glory for an individual and inspiration for many.
I think it's the most important reason precisely because I too am not sure that the often stated reasons are justification enough.

 

[Atlan0001]

Argument enough! overdue! and on target of a couple million years at least of Earth history and how the thing repeatedly works:

Atlantic Ocean is headed for a tipping point − once melting glaciers shut down the Gulf Stream, we would see extreme climate change within decades, study shows

Scientists now have a better understanding of the risks ahead and a new early warning signal to watch for.

theconversation.com

Eighty-thousand to a hundred and twenty-thousand years of "Ice Age" with short interludes of twenty thousand to thirty thousand years of "Global Warming"! "Ice Age" is the Earth norm! Two hundred years at the warmest time of Global Warming has been the longest period of Earth's "fall off the cliff" point into the fullness of Ice Age.

 

[Atlan0001]

There will be no "efficiency of unmanned missions in scientific exploration" once the price of no human spaceflight, or the decline of human spaceflight, is weighed. The price of an "efficiency of unmanned missions in scientific exploration" will climb inevitably and inexorably to an untenable, unaffordable, infinity.

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

I just don’t see mining anywhere being cost effective, what with the cost of launching not much of anything into LEO, let alone getting substantial equipment, people, etc to some asteroid. Then there’s how to get this stuff back to Earth, and then landing it somewhere. Crash it in the ocean, you’ll lose it; crash it on land . . . Well, no comment needed.

I'm going step out on a limb here and say that you're not necessarily correct in your assumption. Need can and will drive will, which invariably leads to way. Long way of saying "where there is a will there is a way."

It is no secret that every single resource on this planet has a finite value (amount thereof?) So, the need will eventually become unfulfillable here on our planet earth.

Not to mention that you hit on the most probable of solutions to that dilemma. Low Earth Orbit. meaning who ever said or where is it written that manufacturing and processing of finished goods has to happen here on Terra-Ferma.

So, if space born platforms (right now in its smallest of examples) like the ISS can be built for scientific exploration? Why would the next step; for the conduct of commerce not be doable as our technology increases?

 

[Atlan0001]

....
So, if space born platforms (right now in its smallest of examples) like the ISS can be built for scientific exploration? Why would the next step; for the conduct of commerce not be doable as our technology increases?

Science rides . . . is carried . . . on the back of commerce. No increase in energy in commerce, no expansion of commerce to new frontiers, money being just a token of energy, civilizations fall into a negative quicksand of ever-increasing debt and money inflation; dependent sciences being cut, falling by the wayside, one by one, two by two, three by three....

 

[billslugg]

People with cash will fund factories in space that can ride a large metallic asteroid, vaporize what is under foot, segregate out the valuable portion (all metals heavier than iron) and send them back to LEO using tugs. Then they would get grappled by Earth return vehicles. Musk's stated future cost is less than ten dollars to orbit. Coming back is less than that. Things like platinum and rhodium have immense value as catalysts.

 

[Atlan0001]

When space colonization begins there will be little that needs to come back to Earth. Earth will be part of a growing, energizing, New Frontier but only part. Industries will be leaving for the stations (such as factory stations) and colonies in space to stay. People will be leaving for them to stay. There will be a growing exchange of energies, a growing commerce, between the colonies and the home world but the greatest growth will be inter-Solar Systemic -- on the way to interstellar -- with Earth gradually becoming a sideshow . . . a richer sideshow for being a part of the big show, but still increasingly a sideshow..

 

[Cisventure Astronot]

I feel like more people need to declare the point of their argument, or this might result in people who actually agree arguing. If I say rockets are too expensive for humans, someone else might say they aren't in reference to near future rockets because they think I'm dismissing the concept of human's going to space ever.

My opinion is that we will need to colonize space someday if our goal is to serve humanity, and there is work we can do right now, but I can't say whether it's worth it without extensive information on NASA's budget, the most prestigious professionals, and a crystal ball powerful enough to predict politics.

The rest of this post is elaboration on that point, so feel free to skip it if you agree with me.

Robots and humans have their own uses. Robots might be the most inexpensive option for a small scope science mission, but if your mission is to survive the end of all life on earth, then no amount of robots in space can do the job.

A return on investment is historically what drives colonization, FYI I'm not good at history, but that doesn't mean it's right. Imagine a peasant saying, "Historically the higher classes make all the decisions, and they only do things that benefit them, so we should keep doing that instead of what's best for humanity as a whole.". The reason NASA is government funded is because what they do doesn't make financial sense.

It's the place of the government to do what the industry would never. If the government only policed, fought wars, made roads, regulated, etc. if it made financial sense, then they wouldn't exist at all.

The issue is that NASA's budget is too small to do everything, so maybe they shouldn't do any manned missions for a decade or two, but I believe that it's something they should do eventually.

p.s. I'm sorry if some parts of this look like mockery, I don't mean to, but I don't feel like revising this post. And sorry for rambling a little.

 

[Atlan0001]

Your two titanic mistakes, "someday" and "NASA!" Money wealth doesn't develop an intrinsic value without explosive expansions of energy (money wealth is no more than a token of energy!) . . . the need for SPACE FRONTIERS.

What explodes in a closed world system without SPACE FRONTIERS? In a closed system going on far too long a closed system? A 'complicate embryo' of imploding disorders and shredding divisions! A closed systemic 'Iron Curtain' bubble cocoon of inexorably invincible, invulnerable, Iron Curtain bubbles within the only vulnerable part, the overall anti-opening (anti-opening SPACE FRONTIERS) master link making the womb-world's system closed off and resistant to positive dynamics . . . yesterday! . . . not tomorrow!

 

[billslugg]

When you have a ship with a leak, it is prudent to devote 100% of the resources needed to fix the leak and if any resources are left over, then start making a lifeboat.
I'm fine with LEO and Moon distance crewed spaceflight, we are good at it and we spend but 0.4% of our resources on it. Establishing a colony on Mars would require a return to Apollo level funding, 4% of GDP in some years, 2.4% average over 10 years. We have far more important priorities right here on Earth than a Mars colony.

 

[Atlan0001]

I'm not talking about Mars here but I am talking about Man expanding into in space frontier in space stations, spaceships, cloud-city-state-like orbital Space Colonies, and whatever of other human, and other life, facilitations in space. Two New (Frontier) Worlds, including homeland Earth, in one bigger picture of energy exchange that didn't exist before and won't exist without it. It looks 2-dimensional but it is in fact the making and filling of a 3-dimensional -- actually an even more multi-dimensional than 3-dimensional -- vacuum . . . there, HERE!, and all points in between! You don't, and never will, get it from a 1-dimensional One World-Ism!!!!

The physics of a growing exhaust in growing outflow alone, as proved throughout the history of life and the world of Man, will be a growing "return on investment"! Perpetually running on a treadmill in place kills! . . . is inherently a decline and fall!

The vast majority of those who remain on Earth, in the Old-New World of Earth, will be better, and ever better, off for the existence of the growing energies, the growing intrinsic wealth, of the benign non-destructive outflow (the new births) of life and frontier civilization out.

 

[Atlan0001]

Daniel Webster and Horace Greeley, early on in the first half of the 19th century both claimed the western territories of teh United States weren't worth the possession or a dime of investment and far too costly in lives. Alien raw, harsh and forbidding, and worthless! As time passed and exhaust of energies to the west grew, and overall wealth and development "return on investment" increased accordingly, they changed their minds and calls 180 degrees.

I'd bet few today know how hard it was for Columbus traveling back and forth to every major capitol in Western Europe trying to find and get investment for his crazy idea of finding a way to the East by sailing West. It was a group of ex-Jewish private bankers who by their willingness to take on the great risks of the investment, that got monarchs Ferdinand and Isabella to finally agree to invest. A dispatch rider from the Spanish court caught up to Columbus on his way to London and King Henry, who had finally expressed an interest and willingness to take on the risk, and turned him around. Cathay and the East Indies weren't there where he thought they were but something totally unrealized and unexpected, eventually called the "Americas" (and the totally unexpected 500-odd years rich "return on investment"), was.

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

People with cash will fund factories in space that can ride a large metallic asteroid, vaporize what is under foot, segregate out the valuable portion (all metals heavier than iron) and send them back to LEO using tugs. Then they would get grappled by Earth return vehicles. Musk's stated future cost is less than ten dollars to orbit. Coming back is less than that. Things like platinum and rhodium have immense value as catalysts.

I can't but agree with you. In the beginning (of space born refining) it does in fact make sense to do most if not all of a given metal and/or mineral's processing down to its least practical shipping size; at least when it comes to its transportable cost effectiveness. But if history teaches us anything then we know that as human progress happens, and situations change, the manufacturing process can and in most instances moves to where the refining is happening. For example, the Americas in the 1400s as compared to the Americas in the 2000s.

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

I feel like more people need to declare the point of their argument, or this might result in people who actually agree arguing. If I say rockets are too expensive for humans, someone else might say they aren't in reference to near future rockets because they think I'm dismissing the concept of human's going to space ever.

My opinion is that we will need to colonize space someday if our goal is to serve humanity, and there is work we can do right now, but I can't say whether it's worth it without extensive information on NASA's budget, the most prestigious professionals, and a crystal ball powerful enough to predict politics.

The rest of this post is elaboration on that point, so feel free to skip it if you agree with me.

Robots and humans have their own uses. Robots might be the most inexpensive option for a small scope science mission, but if your mission is to survive the end of all life on earth, then no amount of robots in space can do the job.

A return on investment is historically what drives colonization, FYI I'm not good at history, but that doesn't mean it's right. Imagine a peasant saying, "Historically the higher classes make all the decisions, and they only do things that benefit them, so we should keep doing that instead of what's best for humanity as a whole.". The reason NASA is government funded is because what they do doesn't make financial sense.

It's the place of the government to do what the industry would never. If the government only policed, fought wars, made roads, regulated, etc. if it made financial sense, then they wouldn't exist at all.

The issue is that NASA's budget is too small to do everything, so maybe they shouldn't do any manned missions for a decade or two, but I believe that it's something they should do eventually.

p.s. I'm sorry if some parts of this look like mockery, I don't mean to, but I don't feel like revising this post. And sorry for rambling a little.

I like, and find what you have to say here; as thought provoking.

In my view I don’t see anything, you’ve said here, as something I consider as mockery. I doubt anyone else that reads with an open mind will reach a negative view of what you say either.

Forward from there I guess that in as far as a crystal ball goes, we’re SOL on that one.

Now for as far as the NASA budget goes. The real problem there is that government, and rightly so, has to go with the flow of what the taxpayer wants.

So, if the people want manned exploration, then the budget can and will increase; of course, that’s if and only if, it’s what the taxpayer wants and only for as long as the taxpayer wants it.

Commerce as you say is profit driven. However, history does show that as technology increases the processing and manufacturing along with their associated cost will also decrease.

It also shows us the refining and manufacturing eventually move to where the raw and refinable materials are found.

Which as I see it will necessitate the use of both robots and humans to accomplish the production of consumer wants and needs.

 

[Atlan0001]

Follow-up on #45:

Mars would not equate to the 1492 BCE Americas for a surprise discovery for Europe 1492 BCE. Mars 2024 BCE equates to Iceland 1492 BCE.

What is predicted to equate for Earth in the 21st century BCE (and beyond) to the 1492 BCE surprising discoveries of and in the Americas' and other Maritime frontiers for 1492 BCE Europe is the manmade [in-space] Space Colonies colonization of the high frontiers of the Solar System . . . in local area networks (LANs) of custom functional personalized colonies (PCs) and a greater wide area network (WAN).

 

[arturo.v.dominguez@gmail.]

Follow-up on #45:

Mars would not equate to the 1492 BCE Americas for a surprise discovery for Europe 1492 BCE. Mars 2024 BCE equates to Iceland 1492 BCE.

What is predicted to equate for Earth in the 21st century BCE (and beyond) to the 1492 BCE surprising discoveries of and in the Americas' and other Maritime frontiers for 1492 BCE Europe is the manmade [in-space] Space Colonies colonization of the high frontiers of the Solar System . . . in local area networks (LANs) of custom functional personalized colonies (PCs) and a greater wide area network (WAN).

Mars would not equate to the 1492 BCE Americas for a surprise discovery for Europe 1492 BCE. Mars 2024 BCE equates to Iceland 1492 BCE.

Ok, the concept has merit, the analogy I would hope doesn't. To me it suggests that just as with the discovery of the Vikings (Captain Eriksson? who may) had visited the Americas long before Christoper Columbus. Any mission to mars will be a long-forgotten adventure to future explorers and or colonist; that come after it.

I would say the possibility of that happening is next to zero. Not just because we have and there exist better and more available records keeping capabilities.

But because unlike the moon a satellite of our planet. Mars is a sister planet, and we would likely discover that it has far more resources we could use than we have identified via observation and probing missions.

So yeah, maybe like with the moon it would take a few decades for us to finally realize what we have there; but centuries ...I don't think so.

 

[Atlan0001]

Mars would not equate to the 1492 BCE Americas for a surprise discovery for Europe 1492 BCE. Mars 2024 BCE equates to Iceland 1492 BCE.

Ok, the concept has merit, the analogy I would hope doesn't. To me it suggests that just as with the discovery of the Vikings (Captain Eriksson?) who may had visited the Americas long before Christoper Columbus. Any mission to mars will be a long-forgotten adventure to future explorers and or colonist.

I would say the possibility of that happening is next to zero. Not just because we have and there exist better and more available records keeping capabilities.

But because unlike the moon a satellite of our planet. Mars is a sister planet, and we would likely discover that it has far more resources we could use than we have identified via observation and probing missions.

So yeah, maybe like with the moon it would take a few decades for us to finally realize what we have there; but centuries ....I don't think so.

As I've repeatedly said, Like the Apollo Moon Project was, a Mars project for a century and more will always have a "Damocles sword" hanging over its sinkhole down a gravity well! A "Damocles sword" always hanging by a single thread awaiting cutting by a Nixon budgetary signature, by a war, by civilization's decline and fall.... Unlike the High Frontier of SPACE it won't have the locality ("Locality! Locality! Locality! . . . always 'Locality'!") and many global multi-national industries, commercial, and human dimensions to keep it going after only a few decades, even after only a few years, after a real beginning.

 

[billslugg]

The only reason for the Apollo program was to show the world we were superior to the Soviets. It worked well, they went under in 1991. There was no compelling scientific reason to go to the Moon that would have justified the enormous expense. There is no compelling reason to put humans on Mars at this point in our evolution.