US policy could thwart sustainable space development, researchers say

Dec 28, 2019
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Oh please -- whoever wins the election will do the same thing we have been doing in the fifty years since the Small Step for Man -- buying votes with the money. If we wanted to have anything to do with the future of Space, it would have been done four decades ago and we wouldn't be having this conversation.
 
Going through the U.N.'s All or Nothing type of communistic rigidity (iron curtain) guarantees the nothing we've seen over the past decades since the Outer Space Treaty and the Moon Treaty (administration after administration has followed along with it regardless of the fact we've never officially ratified the Moon Treaty). Revolutionary evolutionary Individuality (including the economic entrepreneurial) is the sole route of progress that has ever existed. Bureaucracy's deadweight is the heart of all or none. It is the whole of the U.N.

Power corrupts. Absolute power, all or none power, commune power or nothing, corrupts absolutely. If I had enough money and enough time left, I would be willing to bet that neither China nor Russia will wait on the U.N. for anything having to do with Space, though both will demand vehemently that the U.S. wait. They will be as slow as all get out, at a hellish cost to their people since they [will] go in totalitarian wrong directions far more often than not, but regardless they will try for Space.... And thus Space Power! Any weak U.S. administration will wait, whine, and lament, until it's too late... until China and/or Russia own the space frontier, space power, and control all the means to it.

Has anyone here ever read Mahan's 'The Influence of Sea Power Upon History'? His included essay discourse on sea power 130 years ago applies ten times over, a thousand times over, to space power now and tomorrow, and if humanity reaches it on a permanent basis, forever more. The U.S., the West, Western Civilization (high dynamic civilization), needs to lead the way (with its way).
 
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Oh please -- whoever wins the election will do the same thing we have been doing in the fifty years since the Small Step for Man -- buying votes with the money. If we wanted to have anything to do with the future of Space, it would have been done four decades ago and we wouldn't be having this conversation.

The main reason we haven't done more the last 40 years is getting to space has been too expensive. The Space Shuttle first launched in 1981, 39 years ago. It was *supposed* to lower launch costs, but that didn't work out. All the other rockets have been throw-aways, and the hardware was expensive.

So mainly what's been launched are science and national security payloads, and commercial ones where the product has zero mass. That's things like broadcast, communications satellites, weather, Earth observation, and navigation (GPS).

Today, companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin are building rockets that throw away less or none of the hardware. The propellants for a rocket have always been a minor cost. So that's leading to cheaper access to space.

Another thing that's happened the last 40 years is the known near Earth asteroids have increased from 51 to 23,800. Some of them are easier to reach than the Moon due to their orbit and that you don't need to consume propellant to land on them like you do on the Moon. They also can contain both water and carbon compounds, like the asteroid Bennu we are about to grab a sample from. Water + carbon can be converted to oxygen and methane to fuel your rockets. So asteroid operations can be self-fueling.

Finally, for near-Earth operations out to the Moon, we now have much better computers, laser communications, and virtual reality. So robots can either operate themselves, or remotely in real-time by operators on the ground. That stuff wasn't available 40 years ago.
 
Oct 9, 2020
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Ridiculous article!
Every indication is that the privatization of Space should have begin at least 40 years ago.
i.e. Space X.
Government should not be in the business of exploration or business. Because, politics not achievement will rule the decision making process. The U.N. is pretty much a useless organization.
Sorry authors Socialism does not work! Please go back to applying for grants to study useless redundant subjects and let those of us that want to see the future continue.
 

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