What is Digg?141 Comments
- inhaler, on 12/23/2007, -4/+37Dugg just because I do a little "huzzah" every time I hear Spirit is still alive and kicking.
- allaboutdatiki, on 12/23/2007, -1/+23Spirit needs to find a new front wheel *and* a carwash ...
- fascistpig, on 12/23/2007, -1/+21Would Ron Paul get rid of NASA?
- smurfsahoy, on 12/23/2007, -0/+20people who actually have some grasp of science.
- nakile, on 12/23/2007, -1/+18 I come in here expecting "You mean the rovers are still running?" and "I for one, welcome our Martian overloads." just to find people talking about the RIAA and Ron Paul.
What the hell? - RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -2/+19Ron Paul would have cancelled the rovers.
- yogurtslinger, on 12/23/2007, -1/+17What the ***** are you even commenting on? There isn't even a story on the front page regarding the RIAA.
Even though i agree with your comment i'm still gonna digg you down. - KaJuN4, on 12/23/2007, -0/+14It's absolutely amazing that a 90 day mission has been going on for nearly four years. Job well done to all those who designed and built these tough little rovers! Keep the photos coming, they're fantastic!
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -0/+13Where is proof that we didn't land on the moon?
Where is the proof that the pictures are phoney?
Where is the proof that the space suits are phone?
Where is the proof that the lunar lander couldn't land?
There's overwhelming evidence that this was all real. Even Occam's Razor supports it - it would have been far easier to actually land on the moon than to fake it.
The onus is on you to provide evidence to support your claim. Credible evidence, I mean. - AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+11-sigh- What evidence do you have to support your extraordinary theory that we did not land on our moon on our first landing there? There were many other moon landings, and we humans have done countless other exploratory missions into space. I have examined the evidence for the theory that the first moon landing was a hoax before, and I thought it was extremely weak and uncompelling.
- Double-Z, on 12/23/2007, -0/+10These rovers are one of the coolest things that's happened in the 40 years of my life.
It makes me really sad to see that much dust has accumulated. When one of these little guys stops responding, I will shed an inner tear. I've been following them since long before they were launched. *glances over at lego rover on shelf* - AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+10We have thousands upon thousands of photos of our moon from space exploration, I cannot fathom your rationale for them all being fake.
Umm... Fake space suits... ? Er...
Fake lunar lander? What? Uhh...
............ - RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -0/+10Not really.
Skylab was discarded because it was designed to be discarded. (Batteries and other componants that couldn't be replaced, etc.)
As wonderful as the Saturn V was, it didn't have a mission once the moon landings ended. It could lift 100 tons, where today "heavy lift" is 20 tons. The Shuttle was a good idea - launch and repair satellites, and build a space station - but it was poorly implemented.
And selling it to private industry wouldn't have worked. The only part that private industry could make a profit - the only part they'd want - is the commercial satellite launching business. After the Challenger disaster in 1988, they got it - without NASA.
A privately owned NASA wouldn't have deep space probes, the Shuttle, the space station, most of the aeronautical research, or just about anything else it does.
Better to have NASA do things that private industy won't do. - Wacer, on 12/23/2007, -1/+10Nice to see that they have lasted well beyond their 90 Martian day warranty. The corporation will make sure not to make the same mistake again without asking for more money. Sigh.
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -0/+9In addition to what AdamGeld said...
The walls of the spacecraft were much thicker than "about the thickness of heavy duty aluminum foil" - it had to hold air pressure against a vacuum. There was more than one layer.
More importantly, there was a lot of equipment against the outside wall of the spacecraft, with the astronauts in the center. This made the effective thickness was far greater.
Sorry, but radiation isn't magic. - AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+9Of course it was possible, you have not demonstrated how they were in fact exposed to a lethal dose of radiation. Is it possible they could have died from radiation? Yes. Did they get radiation related illnesses? Not to my knowledge. They accepted the risk. Was the shielding ridiculously thin? Yes, and I believe that was probably a mistake. But, we were just trying to accomplish it for the first time. We weren't trying to do it perfectly.
- Wacer, on 12/23/2007, -0/+9The dragging wheel is what caused it to make it biggest discovery. Maybe next time NASA, if feasible, will send rovers that drag a little plow.
- AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+9John Mauldin was referring to radiation from the Sun. NASA decided that instead of protecting the astronauts fully from the radiation, they would take it as an acceptable health risk. The radiation is -not- of a lethal level if they are not exposed to higher than average levels of radiation that are in space.
If a solar flare occurred when they were in space and not in the confines of the orbiter, then yes, they would have suffered severe, possibly fatal radiation exposure. But this did not happen. It was a risk that the astronauts accepted. Why was the lander armor so thin? Because, they accepted the risk.
Why didn't workers at the former Chernobyl nuclear reactor use protective gear? Because they did something stupid. It was a stressful situation, I don't know what more I can tell you than that.
They did not contract cancer because of physics, they were lucky, this happens. They were probably in their orbiter when/if the solar flare came nearby to them, so they were protected from most of the radiation. - inactive, on 12/23/2007, -1/+10You're a liar, but who cares?
- AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+9No, he gave no evidence that we landed on the moon. We are all waiting for you to give evidence to support your claim that we did not, because we think you are a bit out of thought and don't want to bother giving our evidence.
- animal71, on 12/23/2007, -1/+9Oh boy. You're right. The scales have fallen from mine eyes. Everything that the US government says is a lie. Everything I thought I knew is wrong. A curse on my naivetee. No longer will I take it for granted that I am a human being. I may be a squirrel, experiencing a drug induced state of altered reality. You doubt it? Ha. You gullible sucker. Get some healthy skepticism. Everything you know is wrong.
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -2/+10In other words, you'd want them to make a profit. Which in turn means dropping the unprofitable bits.
Which means dropping all the deep space probes. And the Space Shuttle. And the Space Station. And the Hubble telescope. And all the earth observation satellites. And most of the aviation research. And the plans to send humans to the moon and mars.
Just what would you keep? - lmf49, on 12/23/2007, -0/+7believe, its "believe the united states". Obviously your not from around here. Also, conspiracy theories dogging the Apollo missions... that is so Tin Foil paranoia style. get a life.
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -1/+8I watched it. Its pure paranoid fantasy, using a popular documentary technique called "making stuff up".
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -1/+8The dust buildup takes many months. The rovers simply weren't expected to last that long. Under those conditions what would you use the weight for, a wiper that was unlikely to be used, or another scientific instrument?
- m0laria, on 12/23/2007, -2/+9And Chuck Norris will exterminate it.
- inactive, on 12/23/2007, -1/+8Nice, glad to see we are still finding things. Its scary to think that the earth is full of life and the other planets dead. If they had life where did it go? or what happened, wonder if it will happen to us
- AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -1/+8You are on the wrong page Mr. Leet.
- AWooWoo, on 12/23/2007, -0/+6Party on Mars, lets trash it like a good old Earth party
- lmf49, on 12/23/2007, -2/+8right. a ***** $15 windshield wiper just would have been way to extraordinarily brilliant for NASA scientists. Way to go! But props for running this long Spirit, your an inspiration to us all. Keep chugging little rover, hope you make it through the winter.
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -1/+7How do you make probes profitable at all? Sponsorship and selling video clips to the public won't do it - people have tried.
Mining and most of the other things you describe take far too many billions of dollars - and a couple decade - for private industry to be even remotely interested. They have more opportunity to do it now with NASA's help, than in if NASA didn't exist. They're not doing it.
The only space tourism that's been viable has been to to rent the third seat on a Soyus flight. A flight paid for already by government, to a space station paid for by government. Without NASA, those trips wouldn't have happenned.
The only thing with any hope of a profitability in the next decade or so is sub-orbital hops that spend a few seconds in space. And those aren't NASA aircraft.
So we're still left with, "to have a good business case, what part of NASA would you keep?" - AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+6Uh, well, since you cannot refute all of the other progress we have made in exploring our Solar System, why do you believe this one case was a complete hoax? If we could do everything else we have done in space, it is highly probable that we did in fact land on the moon. And we did it over a dozen times, I believe.
- supermanred, on 12/23/2007, -2/+8Seeing as no business would be willing to take on the immense cost of NASA projects, all space exploration would stop and fail miserably, don't kid yourself.
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -0/+6I prefer the opposite approach: NASA should do the things that private industry won't do - research and exploration. To do so, buy services off private industry where possible. That includes launches.
It would be nice if NASA could build a fully reusable launcher, maybe after testing with two or three X-vehicles. Current launch rates - including the small number of launches planned for the planned moon landings - won't pay for development. But once built, NASA should hand it over to private industry rather than competing.
We already have what you propose - a private space industry. That it isn't doing much exploration isn't NASA's fault. - 3tcp, on 12/23/2007, -1/+7You're wrong, the conspiracy is bigger than all that. The conspiracy is to make you think that the US government actually exists at all, the moon landing tha 9/11 are just distractions. The truth is that politicians are robots controlled by extra-terrestrial zionists who are hell bent on establishing a new world order where most humans become enslaved! You need proof? Dick Cheney doesn't have a naval!!!!1
- AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -1/+6I'm sure there is life in some form, somewhere on Mars. At the very least evidence of past life. If it's gone/dead now, that is because planetary conditions on Mars changed dramatically in the past. Will that happen to us in the future? Absolutely, it is only a matter of time scale.
- Wacer, on 12/23/2007, -3/+8To the people who have been following the rovers on mars since they landed, one thing that has bugged me about the design, was that they put no wipers on the solar panels to clean the dirt off of them. I am not saying that they should use them all the time due to abrasion but how hard would a feature like that be?
- RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -4/+9C'mon - that's a fantasy, and nothing more.
Private business works on profit. And amazing and worth-while as the rovers are, there's no way for them to turn a profit.
Don't believe me? Then where are all the private deep space probes? No-one is stopping you from launching one. Especially when, as the Ron Paul crowd would have you believe, private industry can do it so much cheaper.
The fact is, private industry stinks when it comes to real innovation that involves risk. Standard procedure is to wait for NASA or the military to try an idea first. Take ion thrusters. These were demonstrated on the ground in the 1960s, and were far better than current thrusters used for satellite station-keeping. (Satellites are discarded when the the station-keeping fuel runs out.) And yet, private industry didn't use them until NASA flew one in space over 30 years later.
Heck, just look at all the aviation research that NASA does. Private industry makes so much money off aviation, but they're happy with the status quo. As long as a competitor doesn't use some new safety or efficiency idea, there's no need for your company to do so, let alone do research. - RogerStrong, on 12/23/2007, -1/+6>> I would keep whatever part of NASA that they can turn a profit with.
That means pretty much all of it. NASA by default tries not to compete with private industry. Private industry does what is profitable. And so NASA does the rest.
Really, you're talking about scrapping *everything* beyond geosynchronous orbit - and just about everything below it. That includes manned space flight - even Bigelow is counting on selling services to the government for his space station modules.
The only things you can make a profit on - commsat launches and operation - are things already done by private industry. - allengeer, on 12/23/2007, -0/+5You dont need wipers if you design your robot to last only 90 days.
- inactive, on 12/23/2007, -0/+5Have you ever tried to wipe dust off your car window with wipers? It doesnt work very well, in addition, every thing you add or take off a spacecraft has consequences in terms of weight and balance.
- inactive, on 12/23/2007, -0/+5What a joke - I like the part at the beginning where the guy explains "any piece of space junk orbiting plant earth without a trajectory that intersects the atmosphere will be there forever". EVERYTHING in orbit will eventually intercept earths atmosphere without outside intervention! So this sort of sets the tone for the rest of the disinformation distributed as fact in this s called "documentary". So how does research about life on another planet - mars -lead to domination of space as a weapon. You dont need to conquer mars to do that.
- Pplus, on 12/23/2007, -0/+5I think you are all forgetting the fact that NASA's "unprofitable" missions to the moon in the 60's pushed science and technology farther and harder than it had ever been pushed. You personally have a better standard of living because of government funded space programs. You do make one good point, competition does produce results. The space race of the 60's between the US and USSR made some of the largest advancements in technology the world has seen. We may not have returned from the moon with a sack full of money, but the entire world has "profited" from the advancements made by NASA and it's counterparts around the world.
- inactive, on 12/23/2007, -0/+5There were six landings on the moon. Are you telling me that the big bad US Government duped millions of people around the world - and especially tens of thousands of scientists who study this stuff ? You cant even get a blow job in the white house without the whole world finding out about it!! Besides - I have met Neil Armstrong, My Dad worked on the space program at McDonnell in the 60's and 70's and met the astronauts who went to the moon. I have seen the moon rocks personally and they were studied by thousands of geologists from around the world. The only thing being faked here is your theory about how the US could land on the moon six times and keep the fake a secret.
- colifis, on 12/23/2007, -0/+5I'm guessing the next rovers to mars will have self cleaning solar panels. Don't be so hard on the designers for not including them on the 90 day warranty version.
- freakk123, on 12/23/2007, -0/+4AdamGeld, the guys name is "terroristusgov". Something tells me he's blindly gonna be a ***** and there's not much anyone can say to stop him.
On the other hand, I find idiots entertaining. So this is rather enjoyable to watch you school the ***** out of him. - DrivinWest, on 12/23/2007, -0/+4Go read all of www.clavius.org - It's put together by actual scientists who defend humanity's greatest achievement from conspiracy ***** like yourself.
- AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+4No, I understand that. My point is people just have to be interested in exploring space. Once we are, we will succeed in both exploring and making a profit while doing it. Profit will get attention, and it will succeed from then on. It can turn a profit, it just needs an investment, some patience, and good business sense.
- Falldog, on 12/23/2007, -1/+5It's already far pass it's original life expectancy, so I doubt keeping it clean beyond that duration never came to mind.
- AdamGeld, on 12/23/2007, -0/+3I, for one, consider this news very important. Though I am positive there are countless other life forms in the nearly infinite expanse of space, finding some of it would none-the-less be one of the greatest milestones in humanity. It would change our whole society.
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