Space & Astronomy/Space and Astronomy (October 1993).iso/mac/TEXT/SPACEDIG/V16_5/V16NO559.TXT

Internet Message Format | 1993-07-13 | 35KB

Date: Thu, 13 May 93 05:22:59
From: Space Digest maintainer <[e-mail]>
Reply-To: [e-mail]
Subject: Space Digest V16 #559
To: Space Digest Readers
Precedence: bulk


Space Digest                Thu, 13 May 93       Volume 16 : Issue 559

Today's Topics:
              ASTRONAUTS---WHAT DOES WEIGHTLESSNESS FEEL
                          Aurora GIF request
                 DC-X and publicity... is there any ?
                           EOS Info Needed!
                              IP-36 ESM
                            McElwaine FAQ
                     Over zealous shuttle critics
                Philosophy Quest. How Boldly? (2 msgs)
                  Shuttle 0-Defects & Bizarre? DC-X?
    U.S. Government and Science and Technolgy Investment (2 msgs)
                      What does GIRD stand for?
 White Hats Ride Again (was Re: DC-X and publicity... is there any ?)

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----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:24:12 GMT
From: fred j mccall 575-3539 <[e-mail]>
Subject: ASTRONAUTS---WHAT DOES WEIGHTLESSNESS FEEL
Newsgroups: sci.space

In <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:

>PATE, DENNIS WAYNE ([e-mail]) wrote:
>:
>: They hoped a reversal of the
>: situation might also work (i.e. Get them motion sick on the ground, let
>: them recover, and then boost them into space).  To accomplish this,
>: they were constructing some type of miniature roller-coaster (that's
>: how our guide describe the device).

>I was a test subject in that thing.  They're calling it the Pre-flight
>Adaptation Trainer (PAT).  Dr. Harm here at MSC (oops, I mean JSC)
>seems to be in charge.

Hey, a gadget designed to make you barf and it's named PAT.  Now,
that's so nigh-on to a perfect straight line that I can't pass up
comment.  ;-)

--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live
 in the real world."   -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[e-mail] - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me.

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:43:18 GMT
From: Craig Keithley <[e-mail]>
Subject: Aurora GIF request
Newsgroups: sci.space

Has someone scanned in an artist's rendering of Aurora?  If so, is the GIF
available somewhere?

Please reply via email.

Thanks,


Craig

+------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+
|Craig Keithley          |"If looks could kill, they probably will.      |
|Apple Computer, Inc.    |In games without frontiers, war without tears" |
|[e-mail]      |Peter Gabriel, Third Album (1980)              |
+------------------------+-----------------------------------------------+

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:39:24 GMT
From: Henry Spencer <[e-mail]>
Subject: DC-X and publicity... is there any ?
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>  Its seems a bit scarry to me that such a project which for the first
>time in years promisses some hope in changing the current trend in
>massively overpriced boosting capability, lacks much publicity...

The people involved in it have been building hardware rather than writing
press releases.  This is not a high-manpower project; they don't *have*
spare people sitting around.

As I understand it, there has also been some feeling on the part of some
of the project management that publicity was not a good idea.  A lot of
people have been working on changing this view, with some success.
--
SVR4 resembles a high-speed collision   | Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
between SVR3 and SunOS.    - Dick Dunn  |  [e-mail]  utzoo!henry

------------------------------

Date: 11 May 93 17:47:07 -0600
From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey <[e-mail]>
Subject: EOS Info Needed!
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (John F. Lawrence) writes:
> Hi there.
>
> I need some basic information on the EOS (Earth Observing System).  Like project
> goals, history, and milestones.  And anything else that you gurus would consider
> important or unique about the EOS.

There is a nice handbook with technical specs for various EOS spacecraft,
instruments, data systems, etc.  that I picked up at a conference.  I don't
know the title, but I bet the NASA HQ Public Affairs Office at (202)-358-1900
or the Goddard PAO at (301)-344-6255
could help you out.

Submarines, flying boats, robots, talking         Bill Higgins
pictures, radio, television, bouncing radar       Fermilab
vibrations off the moon, rocket ships, and        [e-mail]
atom-splitting-- all in our time.  But nobody     [e-mail]
has yet been able to figure out a music           SPAN:  43011::HIGGINS
holder for a marching piccolo player.
                     --Meredith Willson, 1948

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:56:59 GMT
From: "Phil G. Fraering" <[e-mail]>
Subject: IP-36 ESM
Newsgroups: sci.space

[e-mail] writes:

>: Phil asks:

>: >Has anyone else _YET_ been reminded of the Bugs Bunny cartoon where
>: >Marvin the Martian is going to blow up the earth because "it spoils
>: >my view of Venus?"

>Tommy Mac ([e-mail]) wrote:
>: You a referring, of course, to the Illudium Pu-36 Explosive Space Modulator.
>: I believe NASA, at one point, took some credit for it's development...:-)

I missed Tommy Mac's original posting. I'd like to point out, though,
that the correct spelling is Eludium Q-36 Explosive Space Modulator.

I don't know if Eludium is a real element or not, but to find out,
I'll order some from Edmund Scientific tomorrow.

>Of course!  It was one of the many spin-offs of the Apollo program.
>The device has potential as a propulsion system, but we couldn't
>get the containment to work quite right.  And those dehydrated Martians
>cause us no end of trouble in the WETF.

True. But have you considered that with an adaptor, you could put
it where the WF/PC is now, instead of the WF/PC II, during the next
Hubble refit? The science we could do with it would be a lot more
interesting.

>-- Ken Jenks, NASA/JSC/GM2, Space Shuttle Program Office
>      [e-mail]  [phone]

>     "We at NASA develop cutting-edge technology for our aeronautics and
>      space programs.  We view technology transfer as a way of life.
>      It's one of our top priorities." -- Daniel S. Goldin, NASA Administrator

Has the Dehydrated Martian technology been privatized yet?
--
Phil Fraering         |"Number one good faith! You convert,
[e-mail]|you not tortured by demons!" - anon. Mahen missionary

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:52:16 GMT
From: "Phil G. Fraering" <[e-mail]>
Subject: McElwaine FAQ
Newsgroups: sci.astro,sci.space,rec.arts.drwho

[e-mail] (Mary F. Shafer) writes:

>While I won't address his behavior in other newsgroups, Robert
>McElwaine did stop "posting" to sci.aeronautics after I, the
>moderator, send him one brief message about it being inappropriate.
>Obviously, he did change his behavior based on feedback.

Because you're the moderator. There's noone who can send him
something that would keep him from posting to sci.space.

>On the other hand, he lost his Net privileges on 7 May, after
>appealing to his school's review board, so the entire discussion
>is moot at this time.

>Since my posting from cactus is excellent proof that it's not
>impossible to find alternate accounts, we may yet hear from
>Mr. (Dr.?  I forget) McElwaine again.

Eek!


--
Phil Fraering         |"Number one good faith! You convert,
[e-mail]|you not tortured by demons!" - anon. Mahen missionary

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:23:17 GMT
From: "Phil G. Fraering" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Over zealous shuttle critics
Newsgroups: sci.space

[e-mail] (Ken Hayashida) writes:

>Rockwell International in Downey, California, in conjunction with the
>other shuttle contractors delivered the world's most important and
>most revolutionary space vehicle.

Ha!

>One cannot argue with the fact that
>it flies, lands, and is reusable.

Watch me. It flies. It lands. It gets rebuilt.


>In my opinion, these were the only
>appropriate specifications for this program.

That's not what they told us back in the '70's.

>It has been a test program from the start, a logical follow to the
>X-15 program and the later X-series lifting bodies.

1. It isn't a logical follow-on. A logical follow-on would have
been either a Russian "snowfox" type thingey (for the lifting bodies)
or something like MMI's Space Van (or Boeing's TSTO, or the airbreathing
TSTO the military is allegedly _using_ now that probably cost less
to develop than the shuttle does to fly for a year).

>The engineering specs that the guys in the trenches had were to
>develop a system which was man-ratable, could land reliably, and could
>be reflown.  These goals were quite visionary for the 1970's, and I
>would argue that they are challenging even today, including for the
>DC-X program.

Keep that attitude, and it'll be a couple centuries before we get real
access to space, unless another country without all that baggage comes
along and kicks our ass in the space race.

>I do not recall a 1 flight/week specification in the final NASA specs for the
>space shuttle program.  If you have such documents, I would find them most
>revealing and interesting.  As far as I can tell, the only people touting a
>1 flight per week flight rate were people on Capitol Hill or selling books
>to the general public.

Or NASA HQ. That doesn't give the rest of the program plausible deniability
if we deceide that it wasn't worth the money we've spent, which is by now
probably a lot more than Apollo.

>IMHO, political statements in the halls of the US Congress are not
>admissable as engineering specs because specs should be determined by
>NASA/DOD and contractors, not by Congressmen, Senators, or Presidents.
>Missions are defined by political leaders, but not the engineering
>specs.

Yes, but it gets sold on the basis of the political statements.
You're saying basically that it met the engineering specs (which is
questionable, IMHO) so it's a success, never mind that you couldn't
get the funding the shuttle eats with those engineering specs in
a thousand years.

>The shuttle is the only reusable space vehicle.  This automatically
>qualifies it as an unparalleled engineering success.  You could argue
>about its political success.  But engineering wise, it is clearly the
>most advanced machine ever flown.  I argue that engineering and
>technical data for hypersonic flight is valuable in and of itself.
>Shuttle should be justified or criticized on the basis of economics.

You can get hypersonic flight data with an X-15 or a follow-on X-15
type vehicle for much less.

And economics and engineering are interchangable; engineering in the
absense of economics is basically just physics, and in terms of physics,
the shuttle looks like a failure next to the X-15.


Then Henry wrote:

HS>Sorry, support that I can arrange for launchers all goes to launchers
HS>that I have some hope of riding some day.  At the moment, that's
HS>DC-X's hoped-for successors.

>I was disappointed by this and other similar statements from those vocal in
>support of the DC-X program .  Your support of DC-X is based on hopes.
>My support for the shuttle program is based on record.

The shuttle program has a bad record. I _once_ had hopes for the
shuttle program. By now I know those hopes were false.

All I have for DC-X and similar and dissimilar experimental vehicles
are hopes. But at least I know they aren't false hopes yet.

I did support the shuttle, way back when. It didn't do nearly what
it was supposed to. It's time to move on to something that might do
the job of orbital delivery better. Or at all.


>I think that it is
>also important to note that I do not object to DC-X.  It is visionary.
>I originally posted:

>> I like the DC-X idea...  and I am really hopeful that it'll be a stunning success

>Unfortunately, DC-X'ers are not willing to return that support the
>proven Shuttle program.  Explain why you folks criticize shuttle when
>shuttle is exactly what you guys need in order to learn how to operate
>DC-X on-orbit.

We don't want to learn how to operate on orbit. It launches, it
shoves out the payload, it lands. It doesn't waste payload hauling
up and down EDO pallets and the like.

The only thing to be learned from shuttle is how *not* to build a
launcher.

Finally: that bit about the "proven" shuttle. Are you hoping you can
tell a lie enough times and get someone to believe it?

>I enjoyed your later postings regarding the comparisons between the shuttle
>and the Soyuz project.  Although, I may disagree with your method
>of analysis.  You probably will disagree with mine. 8-)  I think that
>the total impact of the shuttle program must be judged on the scientific and
>technical merit, not on timelines and schedules (do you agree?)

How much science and technology could have been done is the money spent
on shuttle had been spent differently?

...
>As for now, we need to stop thinking of DC-X and shuttle as mutually exclusive.

Learn about economics and the current budget realities in the United States,
please.

>Thanks for your time.

--
Phil Fraering         |"Number one good faith! You convert,
[e-mail]|you not tortured by demons!" - anon. Mahen missionary

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:15:33 GMT
From: fred j mccall 575-3539 <[e-mail]>
Subject: Philosophy Quest. How Boldly?
Newsgroups: sci.space

In <1so3lo$[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Pat) writes:

>THere you go again.  MOre thumb promoting, quinto-podal leaning
>atavism :-)

>I think jane goodal documented basic tool use among the
>gombe chimps.  and i think  any sort of  multi purpose
>tentacle could also make a highly effective affector.

Just about any of the higher primates can probably qualify as a 'tool
user'.  Even otters use rocks (we claim it's 'instinctive').

>I agree,  dolphins  are unlikely to become tool using
>creatures,  but i believe they are high order
>consciences, and our currrent treatment of them is
>despicable.  and morally no different then how
>societies have treated subjugated societies.

I would agree, only more strongly.

>I could visualize some sort of multi-tentacled  land creature,
>which  developes a pretty good  tool culture.  it could even
>be  amphibious, or aquatic.  something like an octopus,
>with a bigger brain.

I can't see an aquatic creature.  Too much of chemistry and metalurgy
becomes too difficult, and flight itself would be more difficult if
you had to haul around that much water.

--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live
 in the real world."   -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[e-mail] - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me.

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:12:22 GMT
From: fred j mccall 575-3539 <[e-mail]>
Subject: Philosophy Quest. How Boldly?
Newsgroups: sci.space

In <1so39r$[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Pat) writes:

>In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Robert Rubinoff) writes:
>|In article <1s8cj8$[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Pat) writes:
>|>the alaskan inuit,  met  westerners and seem to have adapted
>|>quite well.
>|
>|Hardly.  They have tremendous problems with alcoholism and unemployment (among
>|other things).

>ANy worse then the now native white population?
>i used to live in the Great WHite North,  and everyone was unemployed
>and a drunk

Everyone was unemployed and a drunk while you lived there, Pat?  That
seems to explain a great deal.  And now you're an 'inside the Beltway'
manager -- which presumably explains the rest.

--
"Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live
 in the real world."   -- Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[e-mail] - I don't speak for others and they don't speak for me.

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 22:38:22 GMT
From: "Phil G. Fraering" <[e-mail]>
Subject: Shuttle 0-Defects & Bizarre? DC-X?
Newsgroups: sci.space

[e-mail] (Ken Hayashida) writes:

>We see "zero-defects operation" in many area|s of life.
>Calling shuttle flight characteristics *bizarre* in the same post
>as touting DC-X is interesting.

Perhaps because DC-X will have backups on critical systems.
For instance, it has eight separate engine/fuel/oxygen
turbopump sets.

>Just because an untrained pilot crashes a simulator, doesn't mean that the
>whole bird is "bizarre."  I'm sure that the CDR's and PLT's of the STS
>would not call it *bizarre* to fly the orbiter.

Are you sure they *haven't*?

>  I think that its pretty
>obvious that pilots need a great deal of training to fly any plane.
>Do you have different impressions?

Not each separate one!

>DC-X will also have similar "zero-defects" issues (am I wrong?).

Yah. Part of the reason the mass ratio sucks so raw on that thing
are all of the backups.

>I am thinking of how DC-X will deploy a chute or reverse orientation at
>supersonic speeds.  How much in DC-X is redundant?  That's the real question.

Probably too much. Keep in mind, any weight you spend on a redundant
system could have probably gone into making the system harder to break
to begin with.

There's also a thing such as fault-tolerance.

>Everything we do in life has zero-defects issues at times (agree?).
>As a doctor, I can not error in my diagnosis and treatment recommendations.
>An error could cause injury or even death.

Not if the patient can get a second opinion. Which is a good reason
for that option to stay open.

> I see each shuttle mission as a
>flight with similar inherent risks.  DC-X will be no different
>(agree?  probably not 8-) ).

>In medicine, relative risks are always weighed when deciding on diagnostic
>tests and treatments. So, the main issue in medicine is the person making
>the decision.  The inherent characteristics of the drug or test need to be
>understood by the physician, but its really up to the user to know how to
>use the technology.

>I argue that in spaceflight, the central issue is the person making the
>decision.  In fact, this is the whole lesson of the Rogers Commission report
>on the Challenger accident.

No. Sometimes the central issue is the person who froze the design.
PLEASE remember that.

>The risk of loss of shuttle is dependent on the failure mode, dependent on
>the administrators making flight readiness decisions, dependent on the
>engineers and technicians working on each mission, and dependent on the
>highly trained astronauts who fly the vehicle.
>(I'm not counting passenger-astronauts).  If all is good, then no problem.
>If someone messes up, oops!  DC-X will be the same, just as subject to
>human frailties as the orbiter is.

Probably. But we should have vehicles where the failure won't be as
catastrophic. When a shuttle goes, it gets replaced for ~ 2.5-3 billion
dollars (granted, _that_ could be a lot cheaper. There are a lot of ways
the shuttle could have been made cheaper and could be made cheaper that
just aren't going to happen).

>I encourage NASA personnel or contractors to pipe up in this discussion!

Check with Allen Sherzer about how much freedom of speech they have.
It seems to depend on what they have to say.

>While DC-X's R&D program makes good sense, I am less optimistic about DC-X
>as you (and apparently others) are.  I understand your enthusiasm and I share
>that hope.  But, DC-X will still have failures.  It is the nature of aerospace
>R&D.

>It's successors are not slated to be passenger carrying.  The impression I had
>when I visited MacDac Huntington Beach's Open House was that the payload space
>was limited and the man-ratable version was decades away.

That;s the wrong impression. The man-ratable version is available (pulling
numbers out of my hat) probably two years or so after funding (if they rush
it). Of course, after that it'll take a while to "man-rate" it.

Of course, the method they're using for testing is so different from
NASA's standard "man-rating" that they're avoiding that term.

Keep in mind, the shuttle has never been "man-rated" the way the old
boosters were.

>Shuttle is the only method in the free world of orbiting large life sciences
>and medical related packages.  As for now, it is our only ticket into space
>and has my support.



>I am hopeful that DC-X,  or whatever the follow-on is eventually called,
>will perform as you state.  But right now, I must admit that I am more
>skeptical than ever.  This is due to discussions with engineers who are
>skeptical about the developmental timeline, and they work at MacDac.

And I've spoken to others who say the whole thing's been stretched out
past what it should be. Keep in mind there are a lot of people both in
and out of MacDac that have a lot invested in the status quo.

>DC-X has my support, but it is checked by the same realities that confront
>the shuttle program.

You mean the ones that didn't exist when you were praising the shuttle
program three or four posts back?

>You could change my view on DC-X if you could prove the following:
>1  the number failures projected for DC-X are less than the current number of
>failures or potential failures in the shuttle program.
>2  that the payload delivery and return will surpass orbiter operations in
>terms of cost per pound
>3  that the shuttle need not go on hiatus to allow development of a man-ratable
>DC-X successor
>4  Most importantly, that the DC-X will open up LEO to more scientific and
>technical payloads.

1. is non-provable except by building. 2. is much the same, although the
fact that the shuttle is the second most expensive spacecraft flying today
bides well for it. 3. is nonsence. 4. Follows on 2.

>Please keep this discussion technical, not based on wishful thinking (like
>what some engaged in during the beginning of the shuttle program).

Like what you seem to be engaged in now about the shuttle program!

>Thanks for reading.  I'll be looking forward to more comment!
>This completes this long-winded reply, sorry about the bandwidth folks!















--
Phil Fraering         |"Number one good faith! You convert,
[e-mail]|you not tortured by demons!" - anon. Mahen missionary

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 93 20:18:32 GMT
From: Leon Story <[e-mail]>
Subject: U.S. Government and Science and Technolgy Investment
Newsgroups: sci.space,talk.politics.space,sci.research,talk.politics.misc,talk.politics.libertarian,misc.education

[Of the above groups, I read only misc.education.]

In article <1sm53c$[e-mail]> [e-mail]. (Gregory McColm) writes:

   I must give way to temptation ...

   1.  Science nowadays is BIG science, and I mean bigness far beyond
   subsidizing ocean voyages like that of HMS Beagle.

The contrast between the current crop of experimental particle physicists
and Gauss or Darwin is very striking, but it's also an unfair
comparison.  Consider Erd\:os or Gel'fand or Hawking (sp?) or Watson or Dawkins...

   [...] we are winning the Nobel prizes while Japan is making the money.

But neither is particularly relevant to scientific achievement, but rather to
    career and economic advancement, so what's the point?

   2.  Continuing in this line, CMFair has suggested that the 20th
   century is the Silver Age in science, while the 19th was the Golden
   Age:  the idea is that we are running on inertia.  I posted this
   suggestion in sci.math, and got some chewing out --- but I still get
   the feeling that for mathematics at least, there is an uncomfortable
   amount of truth in this (the decline seems more noticeable in the
   visual arts, music, literature, and philosophy).

While I wouldn't claim that post-Wittgenstein academic "sects" of
philosophy are particularly exciting, it seems that the combined
work of Russell, Moore, Wittgenstein himself, the Positivists, the
Existentialists, etc. etc.  forms as solid a contribution as any

century has provided.  Though I admit that the major advance since the
Ancients, separating philosophy (esp. ontology) from religious
superstition, occurred primarily in the 19th Century (but continues in
the 20th).

As far as the supposed inferiority of 20th Century art, music and
literature go, the Mr. McColm must have a very sketchy familiarity
with these areas or fiercely conservative (and very bad) taste.  Oh
well..."De gustibus non disputandum."

But spend a week (and I do mean a week) with Schoenberg's piano
pieces, Mr McColm.  Or with a few of Giacommetti's sculptures.  Or
take a month off and read some Joyce and Proust and Mann and Brecht
and Tanizaki and Faulkner and ... (then see some plays, read some
poetry, listen to some jazz; review the best of American film, the French
and Italian and German and Japanese cinema ...)  Bah!

  Comments or flames, anyone?

Yeah, the flame was fun (and seriously meant).

   The greatest scientists of the 19th century were
   Gauss and Darwin,

No argument there, except that Gauss was a mathematician, which is
quite a different animal.  And you might add a dozen others (Lyell,
Gibbs, Maxwell, Mendel, and so on).  Who cares who was "best of all"?
Many people made wonderful discoveries.

    of the 20th, Hilbert and Einstein.

Again, Hilbert was a mathematician (and didn't he do most of his work
in the 19th Century---I'm not sure).  I'd add Bohr and Bohm and Dirac
and Heisenberg and Von Neumann and Feynman.  And Watson and Crick.
And undoubtedly a whole slew of biologists and more recent physicists
I'm unaware of.

    Comparisons?

Why bother.  It's absurd.  The most accurate and elegant physical and
biological theories to date are all (not surprisingly) 20th Century
inventions.  Possible exceptions: Maxwell's electromagnetism (updated
by QED), Darwin's evolution (updated by Dawkins, Gould, Eldridge, etc.
etc.), and maybe Lyell's tectonics.  People probably haven't gotten
more clever, but they haven't gotten stupider, either.

   3.  I didn't know that we got much out of WWI.

Reduction of population.  Like lemmings.  And an outlet for excess
testosterone which was once useful to the defense of our
hunter-gatherer bands.  That's primarily what we get out of any war.
With birth control (and violent but non-lethal games) war is no longer
needed, though we may need to get beyond Capitalist economics too,
which seems to often rely on war to pull us out of the troughs of
business cycles.

I doubt that there is any major scientific discovery attributable to
war and the financing of its murder weapons.  Technology, yes, it's
been accelerated at times, but even that would have appeared in the
civilian market pretty quickly anyways.  Jet engines, for example.

   Snide comment:  If America was the home of the hardy individualists,
   then why were most of the major scientists European?  Because science
   has always been a hobby of the middle class --- the lower class
   doesn't have the time, the upper class doesn't have the patience (I
   was going to say "brains", but I remembered that we shouldn't get
   nasty on Usenet) --- and the American middle class is imbued with too
   many upper class values.

Again I must agree.  In America everyone is "middle class" and not one person
in a thousand has the patience to read mathematics or philosophy.  But
there's another stream in American thought which militates against pure
research:  we are raised to measure our accomplishment in dollars---to act
as economic beings in totally inappropriate areas, far beyond acquiring our
next meal or a roof over our heads.  This economic "self reliance" is a
common American theme, is anything but what Emerson was speaking about, and
leaves little remaining time or psychic energy for the joy of discovery
(or apparently for appreciation of modern music or art, in
Mr. McColm's case :)

--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lee Story                 Boston Technology                [e-mail]
          (stiff-fingered pianist and itinerant creek boater)
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------

Date: 11 May 93 11:20:45 BST
From: [e-mail]
Subject: U.S. Government and Science and Technolgy Investment
Newsgroups: sci.space

It should be noted that the US benefitted not only from German science and
technology after WW2 but also from British science and technology. From the
discovery and manufacture of penicillin to jet engines, swing wing aircraft,
the hovercraft etc etc. all were shipped lock-stick-and-barel across the
Atlantic. We still are suffering from this sort of thing because of some of the
more parochial aspects of US procurement policy. Meiko, a British
parallel computer company, for example, has now moved most of its facilities to
the US since that was the only way it could sell stuff over there.

--
================================================================================
Dave Clements, Oxford University Astrophysics Department
================================================================================
clements @ uk.ac.ox.vax            |  Umberto Eco is the *real* Comte de
dlc      @ uk.ac.ox.astro        |           Saint Germain...
================================================================================

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 11 May 1993 18:48:27 GMT
From: Dennis Newkirk <[e-mail]>
Subject: What does GIRD stand for?
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Sneal) writes:
>A non-networked friend has asked me to inquire about a Russian group that
>was doing rocketry experiments back in the Thirties.  The group, which she
>says was known by the acronym GIRD, was eventually absorbed by the Soviet
>military, and appparently the chief engineer displeased Stalin sufficiently
>that he ended his career in a mine in Siberia.  This information comes from
>a PBS-type show called "The Russian Right Stuff".  My question, then, is
>does anywhere here know what GIRD stood for?
>
>Please reply via email, and thanks in advance.

I have emailed a reply, but for those interested:

GIRD = Group for the Study of Jet Propulsion

In the 1920's a group called OIMS (All-Union Society to Study
Interplanetary Communications) with about 150 members was formed from
the Zhukovsky Air Force Academy Interplanetary Flight Group. The OIMS
was disbanded by the early 1930's.

In 1928, Vladimir Artemev's military powder rocket group with about
30 members formed the GDL (Gas Dynamics Lab of the Military Research
Committee). They worked in their own houses and built rockets at the
Leningrad Machine Works.

MosGIRD formed in 1931 after request by the TsAGI (Central Aero-
Hydrodynamics Institute) to the OSOAVIAKHIM (~Society for Promotion of
Defense and Aero-Chemical Development). GIRD groups soon were established
in many major cities.

The GDL apparently became part of the GIRD groups known as LenGRID in
1931 and were holding rocketry lectures in technical schools by 1932.

In 1933 the Ministry of Armerments-Ministry of Aircraft Production
formed RNI1 (~Rocket Scientific Institute 1) was formed from LenGRID and
MosGRID. The GDL was still a single entity and headed by VP Glushko
developing rocket engines, the solid rocket group was headed by AG
Kostikov and GE Langemak, the rocket aircraft group by SP Korolev and
LS Dushkin, ane the rocket vehicles group by Tikhonravov. These 5
groups composed RNI1. IT Kleimenov was the head, Langemak the deputy
director and SP Korolev was also a deputy (probably the others named
were also deputy directors) of the organization.

On June 27, 1938, Korolev was arrested after being falsely denounced by
Kleimenov, Langemak and Glushko in what appears a typical Stalin purge.
Korolev was sent to the mines. In 1942 he was rescued and ordered
to Glushko's group then in Kazan as Deputy Cheif of Flight Testing
of the rocket aircraft (Pe-2) and developing JATO's. His career really
began to take off after the war when he headed the reverse engineering
of the V-2, its production in the USSR and development of larger
ballistic missiles.

The history above mostly comes out of the book "Soviet Rocketry" by
Michael Stoiko, 1970. It has good information on pre-WWII rocket
research in Russia and the USSR. I have not taken time to confirm the
facts above, so beware the dates and names may vary some.

Dennis Newkirk ([e-mail])
Motorola, Land Mobile Products Sector
Schaumburg, IL


------------------------------

Date: 11 May 93 17:58:54 -0600
From: Bill Higgins-- Beam Jockey <[e-mail]>
Subject: White Hats Ride Again (was Re: DC-X and publicity... is there any ?)
Newsgroups: sci.space

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Robert Ivan) writes:
>
>   Its seems a bit scarry to me that such a project which for the first
> time in years promisses some hope in changing the current trend in
> massively overpriced boosting capability, lacks much publicity.

I will skip saying a lot of obvious things about Robert's questions,
because others will surely reply.  In connection with DC-X publicity,
though, I'd like to point out one thing you may not have noticed.

You can't tell this from the DC-X photo published in *AvLeak*, but
from the *Space News* picture one may infer that at the rollout
ceremony McDD was giving out FREE WHITE DC-X FEED CAPS!  This will
probably become *the* fashion statement for 1993.

Now that's my idea of publicity.

Engineer of Hijacked Train:      Bill Higgins
"Is this a holdup?"
                                 Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory
Masked Gunman:
(Hesitates, looks at partner,    Bitnet: [e-mail]
looks at engineer again)         SPAN/Hepnet/Physnet: 43011::HIGGINS
"It's a science experiment!"     Internet: [e-mail]

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End of Space Digest Volume 16 : Issue 559
------------------------------