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Subject: SPACE Digest V9 #261

SPACE Digest                                      Volume 9 : Issue 261

Today's Topics:
             the un/manned debate
             Re: Synthetic Aperture Radar
              Re: 1992 moon base
              Re: 1992 moon base
              Re: 1992 moon base
    Re: Government/Commercial Research, Development and Operations
            Re: centrifugal forces
              Re: 1992 moon base
       Re:Re: French small space shuttle: A go ahead !
              Re: 1992 moon base
     Re: manned vs unmanned, and space commercialization
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Tue, 21 Feb 89 17:00:56 CST
From: [e-mail] (Happiness is planet Earth in your rearview mirror)
Subject: the un/manned debate

The problem with arguing about the value of space research is, what is its
REAL value.  Not the intrinsic value to most participants (knowledge), but,
for instance, what does 1987A have to do with a cure for AIDS or stopping
the greenhouse effect.

What I find myself doing is getting involved with this from a view of space
only.  We don't have the luxury of living in that world.  If someone were
to come forward and offer up a cure for AIDS (or whatever you believe is
a pressing social issue), but the cost would be NASAs budget for the next
year, we'd all be dreaming for a year.

All the research, all the technology that we have going for us, and we still
can't keep people clothed, fed and housed in this country.  If you want
to argue value of research, let service to society be your true standard,
and see how far we all fall from the mark.

We should go the stars because we want to, not because it makes sense.
We should ask questions not for economic return, but because we are curious.

Me, I've spent a week in an ice cave on Denali, so the moon colony sounds
good to me :-)

Dillon Pyron                         | The opinions are mine, the facts
TI/DSEG Lewisville Computer Services | probably belong to the company.
[e-mail]              |
[phone]                        | Did anyone notice Frank Borman at
                                     | Christmas?

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

Date: 22 Feb 89 03:02:55 GMT
From: sgi![e-mail]  (Tom Mitchell)
Subject: Re: Synthetic Aperture Radar

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Joe Dellinger) writes:
>
>     Unfortunately, they lamented at the seminar that in Mexico there
> HAS NEVER BEEN A GEODETIC SURVEY!

Good surveys are not cheep. And they are rare in Mexico.  This is one
of the reasons our railroads were given the 20 mile checkerboard for
completion of the railroads in the west.  They only got the
checkerboard IF it was surveyed and the rail was set..

It seems like a big give away today.  But I don't think so.  In Mexico
today one of the largest expenses for mineral exploration is bringing
in the required high quality survey to the property boundaries.  A
single monument can cost $+20,000 (1971 dollars).  No wonder the masses
cannot rise above it.

>     The question is, is there some way to CHEAPLY measure such
> ground motions (on the order of a meter or two) from space?
>     I asked him about it, and he said if you wanted to be accurate
> you'd probably need to lay out a grid of Radar corner reflectors. These
> would be half-cubes of metal about ~1m on a side. Should be cheap.

Yes,  A couple of years back Bendix had a thing in one of the employee
magazines which described a ~12inch sphere with imbedded optical corner
cube reflectors.  This had been launched into orbit just for high
quality surveying.  I have since seen (Science) articles with the same
truck van doing 'high' quality surveying in the context of earthquake
predictions.  As the technique is optical locations may be determined
within a couple of cm or so.

The best way to research this is a computer search on the "Palmdale
Bulge".  There was a large bunch of articles c.5 years back when
someone noted that geodedic leveling indicated a 'uplift' of a
large area adjadcent to the San Andreas fault.

As always only believe a bit of what you read,

--
Thomas P. Mitchell  ([e-mail])
Rainbows -- The best (well second best) reason for windows.

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

Date: 21 Feb 89 13:25:57 GMT
From: rochester![e-mail]  (Paul Dietz)
Subject: Re: 1992 moon base

Keith P. Mancus writes:

> I fail to see why rovers couldn't be operated around the clock,
> period.  Putting searchlights on them is no big deal.

My concern was not vision.  After all, military light intensifiers
allow soldiers on Earth to see reasonably well by starlight, the rover
(at least on the near side) will have a Full Earth overhead, and,
because of slowness due to transmission delays, it should be possible
(if not necessary) to take several second exposures.

I was worried about power.  I assumed the rovers would be solar
powered.  Keith suggested using a RTG instead.  Would this be
feasible?  If so, round-the-clock operation is no big problem.
Indeed, if the rover uses optical communications the SNR for
the signal from the rover would be higher at night.

    Paul F. Dietz
    [e-mail]

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

Date: 22 Feb 89 02:15:25 GMT
From: mailrus!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: 1992 moon base

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Paul Dietz) writes:
>>... A shuttle-based plan made *today* cannot
>>assume oxygen/hydrogen without orbital assembly or something like that,
>>but before January 1986 oxygen/hydrogen was a reasonable choice of fuel.
>
>It was reasonable only in the sense that NASA was saying that it was
>reasonable.  NASA said lots of silly things...

And a lot of things that originally made sense got retroactively declared
silly because NASA didn't feel like bothering any more.
--
The Earth is our mother;       |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
our nine months are up.        | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry [e-mail]

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

Date: 20 Feb 89 19:31:34 GMT
From: asuvax!enuxha![e-mail]  (Norman C. Kluksdahl)
Subject: Re: 1992 moon base

In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Paul Dietz) writes:
   [ lots of stuff deleted ]
>
> While earth-operated rovers may be slower, they could be operated around
> the clock (at least during the lunar day).  Earth-bound operators would be
> many times less expensive than lunar colonists.
>
How about this:  If we can put teleoperated lunar rovers on the surface, which
can then survey the terrain and find good deposits of materials, why not
follow up these rovers with teleoperated materials extraction robots, to
extract and stockpile materials such as glass, aluminum, iron, silicon, etc,
for a permanent colony to follow later?
Iron could be relatively easily gathered with magnets, and since the soil
has lots of silicon dioxide, glass would be easy to manufacture.  But how
about aluminum?  Has anyone done any study of a closed-loop method for
extracting aluminum from the lunar soil?  If possible, it would make a good
building material.  How about silicon?  If pure silicon (i.e. 98% +) can
be extracted, then a robotic float-zone puller could eventually get pure
enough silicon for the manufacture of solar cells.  If the process is highly
automated and produces large quantities, then even 5% efficiency is adequate.
What about power storage?  Are the materials present to construct batteries
of any form?  In a closed-loop process?

In short, if we could put a teleoperated surveyor on the lunar surface, why
not go one step further and stockpile resources?  Apart from the $$$$$$$$$$,
what's to stop it?


Norman Kluksdahl              Arizona State University
            ..ncar!noao!asuvax!enuxha!kluksdah

standard disclaimer implied

Useful criticism always appreciated.  Senseless flames always discarded.

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

Date: 21 Feb 89 05:00:58 GMT
From: right![e-mail]  (Nick Szabo)
Subject: Re: Government/Commercial Research, Development and Operations

In article <[e-mail]> mordor!rutgers!pnet01.cts.com![e-mail] writes:
>The real space policy issue is where, on the spectrum of
>technical maturity and risk from research to development to operations,
>should the government be prohibited from stepping in to provide
>direct support/subsidy and what controls should be put on that
>support so as to avoid self-serving porkbarrel and good-ole-boy
>networks?

My analysis is based on U.S. politics.  The U.S. had a very successful
history of policies that promoted new industries and opened new frontiers.
(Note the past tense).

Government should provide funds for both exploration (as it did for Lewis
and Clark et. al.) and basic research.  Furthermore, it should provide
incentives for the creation of new industries, as with the railroad (c.
1840-1870) and air transportation in the 1930's.  It should not own or
operate these industries.

Translating these policies into the current space program, the government
should fund scientific missions (eg planetary probes, Mission to Planet
Earth) based on their science return, and basic R&D to develop better
technology for future scientific and commercial applications.  It should
subsidize new industries of large potential by providing garunteed purchases,
tax breaks, patents, import quotas, etc. to the extent that these measures
do not harm other new industries.

A technology is mature enough to be operated privately if it can be done
at a profit, given reasonable government new-industry incentives.
Launchers can and should be operated privately (except time-critical
launchers for the DoD).  Similarly, communications (including TDRSS and
the DSN) and remote sensing should be privately operated.  Research in
commercial applications (eg free fall processing, optical space communications)
is properly done by  the government.  Incentives for private research (eg
patent rights and flight cost subsidies) are also desirable.

Environmental constraints, labor regulations, etc. should be softened
where needed as an incentive to new industry, with the full knowledge that
these constraints will be stiffened to the norm after the short incentive
period.  Internationally, the government should promote the interests of the
new industries under its jurisdiction, and provide free legal counseling.


Nick Szabo              [e-mail]

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

Date: 22 Feb 89 03:46:17 GMT
From: gauss.rutgers.edu!math.rutgers.edu![e-mail]  (Hans Aberg)
Subject: Re: centrifugal forces

The reply to the question in the long form is yes, if there were
vacuum, or no other forces keeping the object in orbit, there would
no artificial gravity. (But an aeroplane is hard to maneuver in
vacuum.)

The short form question is more tricky, because one needs to define
the meaning of a centrifugal force; so I leave that.

Hans Aberg, Mathematics
[e-mail]

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

Date: 21 Feb 89 17:55:27 GMT
From: mailrus!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo![e-mail]  (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: 1992 moon base

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (daniel mocsny) writes:
>> "We can't just dump people in covered wagons and expect them to huddle
>> heroically while we try to build a railroad to bring them back."
>
>I see similarities in the analogy, but important differences...

Agreed that the cases are not entirely parallel (although they are not
parallel in more ways than you mention, notably the fact that we've got
much better technology to send with our pioneers), but I think I made
my point:  historically, colonization has often been a one-way trip with
return difficult or impossible, and it is not ridiculous to assume the
same in space.  Such an assumption may not be *desirable*, but it is
not ridiculous; there would be no shortage of volunteers.
--
The Earth is our mother;       |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
our nine months are up.        | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry [e-mail]

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

Date: 21 Feb 89 21:09:05 GMT
From: [e-mail]  (Jean-Marc Debaud)
Subject: Re:Re: French small space shuttle: A go ahead !

>You should care about your titles: Hermes is a *European* project, backed
>up by the ESA. Your national pride, although comprehensible, gives a strange
>idea of Europe to the locals on your side of the Atlantic:
>       France first
>       Great Britain never
>       Germany sometimes

In a way I have to agree with the above.
But for *HERMES* the case is the same that with ARIANE.

At the biginning NO ONE else wanted to support it or to be part of it.
Then when the project began to engrange successes, everybody
joined the train !!  The Germans being the more honest of all.

HERMES follow the same path. 2 years ago nobody wanted to hear
about it. To push it the French agreed to pay for more than one half of cost.
Now (almost) every nation wants its name on it !!

>And *for once* i may share some of Tatcher's fears: The Hermes project is
>more the result of national/european pride and political motives than the
>outcome of a real need. It will be dependant on a heavy and expensive booster,
>and will be redundant with the American and Soviet shuttles.

Bruno, if you were following the discussion in American politics, you would
realise
than very few people are ready to share any technologies concerning space or
the shuttle in particular. Yes we will have an almost redundant system but it
will be ours and we won't have to wait and prostitute ourselves.

Remenber the outrageous conditions that Americans space launchers asked 10-20
years ago for satellite launchs until the monopoly was broken by Ariane !!

We can't afford that !.

A funny things is the new openness of the Soviet. We can do more with them now
than with the Americans.

(I want to add that this is no insults to the American audience. I am studing in
this
country and very happy to be doing so !!)

To speak about the British Government. I agree with you Bruno. The English people
in great generality support Europe.

Just the attitude of the English government (expressing also the fears of the
American
to see Europe unifying itself) is making me mad. !!!

Jean-Marc.
[e-mail]

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

Date: 22 Feb 89 02:46:59 GMT
From: mailrus!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!utgpu!utzoo!sq![e-mail]  (Mark Brader)
Subject: Re: 1992 moon base

In case my article with the incredibly stupid mistake about the lunar
poles has escaped my cancel message and reached you -- please ignore it!

Mark Brader, SoftQuad Inc., Toronto, utzoo!sq!msb, [e-mail]
    "I'm a little worried about the bug-eater," she said.  "We're embedded
    in bugs, have you noticed?"        -- Niven, "The Integral Trees"

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

Date: 21 Feb 89 13:44:01 GMT
From: uccba!uceng![e-mail]  (daniel mocsny)
Subject: Re: manned vs unmanned, and space commercialization

In article <58*[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (bradley thompson) writes:
> Every experiment
> I have personally flown has needed in flight repairs and/or
> modifications in protocol. Simple things kill experiments in
> low gravity. Give me a cranky old STS mission with a overworked
> astronaut any day over an automated satellite experiment.

What prevents you from using a tele-operated rig? Touchy force-feedback
requirements? Rapid time scales making propagation delays unacceptable?
Inadequate video/audio transmission? Lack of suitable binocular/pseudo-3D
display (e.g., VIVED)? The importance of smell?

> What I need is routine access to
> low gravity and cheap experiments. Note I am ommitting cheap
> launch costs. Experiments are usually low mass, therefore low
> launch cost. Companies need routine access to build business
> plans around.

When human life support is necessary, low mass goes out the tailpipe.
If the $ billions wasted on the shuttle had gone into developing
teleoperated devices and cheap, expendable boosters, you would be
much closer to satisfaction today.

Dan Mocsny
[e-mail]

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

End of SPACE Digest V9 #261
*******************