Today, in Andrea's place above the Old Pier Bookshop, he and I were disappointed to learn that a probe to seek out life inside Callisto had been cancelled probably due to lack of funds. Andrea thought that NASA should have retained copyrights to all its discoveries and thus would have been able to establish a Moon Base by now. Also, we do not know the current state of the space program in the midst of the general turmoil and apparently it is getting harder to find reliable information anywhere. We want jetpacks and maybe self-driving flying cars. With jetpacks, we would be able to hop across the Bay from Morecambe to Grange. Currently, we just look out Andrea's window towards Grange.
Interesting times in the Chinese sense.
23 comments:
From Sean M. Brooks:
Kaor, Paul!
I wish you and Andrea would pay more attention to the work being developing space ships at SpaceX. Elon Musk has really shaken up long stagnant space programs. Far more so than a sclerotic bureaucracy like NASA has managed to do in half a century.
Please, go to the SpaceX website!
Ad astra! Sean
What is the status of Artemis?
Kaor, Paul!
I have next to zero hope of NASA successfully carrying out the Artemis project in a reasonable time. NASA is a bureaucracy dependent on Congress approving its funding. The inevitable disappointments/setbacks that has to be expected in such a project runs the risk of Congress cancelling that funding. That in turn in turn encourages NASA to be as cautious as possible, trying to make sure that everything will work right the first time it's tried. That leads to endless delays and budget overruns.
Vastly more progress has been made over the past 20 plus years in the private sector, not the gov't. Because companies like SpaceX were willing to take chances and "test to destruction" new models of space ships, to find out what works and what does not.
So I'm not hopeful about NASA's Artemis project.
Ad astra! Sean
Paul: "seek out life inside Callisto"
Callisto? Not Europa?
What I have heard about both moons is that Europa is the more likely to have life.
Also the last I heard was that Europa Clipper is still on.
Sean:
My understanding is that much of the funding Musk used to develop SpaceX's reusable rockets came from the commercial crew program of NASA.
Musk at least hired competent engineers for that development, whether or not he was responsible for any of the relevant ideas. Now I wonder if his judgement is impaired by ketamine use.
Jim,
Callisto. But that's good about Europa.
Paul.
Kaor, Jim!
I disagree with your apparent minimizing of the role played by entrepreneurs like Elon Musk or Jeff Bezos in space technology. One book I read back in 2018, before Musk's recent demonizing by leftists, was THE SPACE BARONS, by Christian Davenport. In the sections about Musk the author goes into great about how Musk's role was far greater than simply hiring good engineers. Davenport details how deep an interest Musk has in space, using the fortunes he won in the 1990's to provide the funds needed for setting up SpaceX. His was the drive, zeal, inspiration, and energy needed for breaking the long stagnation in space.tech. IOW, a lot like Heinlein's DD Harriman or Anderson's Anson Guthrie.
As for the money SpaceX gained from the US Gov't, that was for transporting US astronauts to the absurdly antiquated International Space Station. Because after the ruinously futile dead end of the Shuttle was mercifully cancelled the US had no other means of getting into space (aside from begging rides from the Russians).
Ad astra! Sean
Perhaps I expressed myself so that I look more critical of Musk than I am.
Being able to hire competent engineers isn't trivial. Without looking deeper than I have, all I can know is that Musk did *at least* that for SpaceX.
As for the Commercial Crew program making the development of reusable rockets at least easier for SpaceX, see by analogy government support in both the US & Canada enabling the construction of the trans-continental railways. That is what is now called a Public-Private Partnership (PPP). I don't think those are necessarily bad, though like anything they can be mismanaged. In both the railway and rocket case able managers were needed & Musk was that at SpaceX.
Now his wholesale firing of government worker looks like the opposite of any sort of careful management. I don't doubt there is some waste in the US government, just as in any large organization, but some examination is needed to avoid 'throwing out the baby with the bathwater'.
Eg: I think it is desirable to have reasonably accurate weather forecasts. Gutting NOAA looks like an ideological response to NOAA providing evidence CO2 in the atmosphere affects the climate.
Thus my suspicion that Musk's competence (at one time very high) is being compromised by something such as ketamine use.
https://futurism.com/neoscope/elon-musk-drug-explanation
Sean,
Musk intervened in British politics to back a racist: one reason for him to be "demonized" by the "left." As I have said before, this "left" seems to be a big bunch of people.
Paul.
Kaor, Jim and Paul!
Jim: I see the analogy you made using railroads as an example of how public/private partnerships can sometimes work. But my point was Musk/SpaceX have gone way beyond the failed methods of a stagnant bureaucracy like NASA.
Let me tell you a secret, however much I agree many gov't agencies should be shut down, I don't expect Pres. Trump and Musk to have much more than modest success doing that. Bureaucracies are notoriously hard to budge!
Paul: Yes, demonizing. I recall very well the hysterics, enraged bellowings, wailing and gnashing of teeth, etc., when Musk wrested control of Twitter (now X) from leftists. These reactionaries had been using Twitter to silence, censor, suppress, etc., conservatives, Christians, libertarians, anyone who dared to oppose or criticize leftists and their manias. These leftists were trying to crush freedom of speech.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
You are hysterical, bellowing, wailing and gnashing your teeth! (How else can we describe that kind of language!) Were "leftists" controlling Twitter? Who are these "leftists"? Is Musk not now silencing, censoring and suppressing? Is he not crushing freedom of speech? Are "leftists" maniacs? Please use more restrained language.
I stand by what I said about Musk's intervention in British politics.
Paul.
There should be a ? instead of a !
Kaor, Paul!
And I stand by what I said about Musk and Twitter/X. And the contempt I have for American leftists.
I do not know enough about UK politics to comment about the incident you mentioned. But if, broadly speaking, that was motivated by the concern many have over unlimited immigration then I would have sympathize with them. Also, my understanding is even Sir Keir Starmer, the Labour PM, admits not all of those concerns are without some justifications.
Last, if Anderson can use Biblical metaphors, so can I. Hence, "wailing and gnashing of teeth."
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
And I stand by what I said about Musk and British politics. Who are these American "leftists"? Please stop using that word without explanation or qualification. And please stop expressing contempt and even more negative emotions towards large numbers of fellow human beings. That does not help to clarify the issues.
Racists have attacked immigrants. The immigrants come in small numbers compared to the British population and have been abandoned to drown in the English Channel. They come from war-ravaged countries and need help.
Even Starmer admits...etc? Starmer is an electoralist politician who bows to racist prejudices and pressures instead of opposing them which fortunately large numbers of British people do. After a wave of attacks on mosques and hotels accommodating immigrants, a second wave was announced but so many of us turned out on the streets to oppose it (against the advice of Labour politicians, needless to say) that the racists backed off. Their leader, Tommy Robinson, backed by Musk, has since been imprisoned.
These are bitter material conflicts and it is a pity to be on opposite sides of them. Let's have less wailing and gnashing and a modicum of common feeling.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
I disagree. My point is this: all sovereign nations have an absolute right to set the terms and conditions for allowing foreigners to come in. Outsiders have no right to shove their way into other peoples countries. If done on a massive scale that will rightly arouse fury and resistance. That is why so many Americans became enraged at "Josip" and his puppet masters when they did next to nothing to stop the hordes swarming in during his Presidency.
I don't care if this or that person is racist. What matters is the principle outlined above.
Good, I'm glad the "electoralist politician" Sir Keir has enough horse sense to realize how unlimited immigration is making the Labour gov't so deeply unpopular.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
We have been through all that about sovereign nations before
You don't care if this or that person is racist? Any racism is a concern because it might spread. In fact, entire organizations and entire social prejudices fostered by governments and newspaper headlines are racist.
The "massive scale" is just a racist fantasy. Social problems like shortages are not caused by immigrants who in fact come here to work for a living and to prop up the Health Service. Small numbers of war refugees drowning in the English Channel because they are crowded into small boats and because the Coast Guard ignore their SOS calls need our help and deserve our compassion. Rage against them, instead of against their persecutors, is an appalling response.
I told you about mosques and hotels being attacked. (Many of the attackers have, thankfully, been imprisoned.) That is way more than just "this or that person" being racist.
Immigration is good for the economy and society. Social dynamism involves inventiveness, innovation and mobility, not restrictions on freedom of movement.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Yes, I don't care, because what matters is the right of sovereign nations to make its own rules regarding immigration.
Irrelevant, what you said about mosques. The UK is far smaller than the US, meaning one or two million foreigners with alien beliefs, barbaric attitudes, etc., is going to cause chaos. And I'm not forgetting the crimes, including acts of terrorism, committed by Muslims.
The more people who think as you do stubbornly refuse to address the most reasonable concerns of those who object to unlimited immigration, the more you are going to drive them to extremism. So if Sir Keir is starting to lean in the direction of limiting the flood, I approve!
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
OK. We have serious problems here. You don't care if racism exists. I say that what matter is the right of individual to freedom of movement, to seek a better life and certainly to flee from war and persecution and to request and find refuge.
It is "irrelevant" to say that mosques were attacked? Alien (different) beliefs? Barbaric attitudes? Millions of immigrants? (If that many people did need to move, then that would be an emergency and something would have to be done about it urgently, not just keeping them out.) It is relevant to refer to crimes by Muslims when mosques are attacked?
Surely there is "stubbornness" on many sides here?! There is not unlimited immigration. The numbers are assimilable. But, if there really were "unlimited" numbers needing to move around, then their needs would have to be addressed somehow, not blocked.
A former British Home Secretary acknowledged in a TV interview that the purpose of immigration controls is not to address "reasonable concerns" about numbers but to keep black people out.
Anti-racist campaigners do not drive anyone to extremism. We isolate the extremists from the wider support that they would gain if we did not oppose them.
Paul.
individuals
I speak from experience. We have seen political organizations with openly Nazi origins growing alarmingly but then driven back, as they recognize, by our campaigns and counterdemonstrations. Mainstream accounts of those periods will tell you that such organizations rose and fell but not why.
Kaor, Paul!
And my point remains this: the absolute right of sovereign nations setting the terms and conditions for allowing foreigners to move into them. There is no right for anyone, from any country, to just waltz into the UK or the US.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
And my point remains this: the absolute right of individual human beings to move around our common inheritance, the Earth, to flee from war or persecution, to seek a better life, to go where the money is better as a Polish man said to me working long hours in a local factory.
Refugees, asylum seekers, economic exiles etc do not "waltz" anywhere. Some of them drown in the Mediterranean or the English channel because safe routes are denied to them. They keep coming because of their human needs and we could do a lot of good in this dreadful world by heeding those needs instead of treating them with disdain: "waltzing"?
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Then we are going to have to agree to disagree.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Nation-states derive their authority from largen numbers of individuals and should serve them, not vice versa.
Paul.
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