4 ms·
gogogaget space race: Redux?
by thefool 15y ago
gogogaget space race: Redux?
- Cushman 15y agoIf only... A space race might revitalize the economy, and is thus political.
- MichaelApproved 15y agoDare I say this? A space race is a massive waste of money. We should be combining resources on large scale projects, not duplicating them. Competition is great to find the fundamental technology but we should unite to build a massive vehicle.
- felipemnoa 15y agoSeeing that you are being left behind is a great motivator. The USA went to the moon to make sure that Russia would not get there first.
- electromagnetic 15y agoWhen you simplify it like that it makes the US look exceptionally petty. ... Does anyone want to tell the American public that the Chinese are going to beat them to Mars?
- MichaelApproved 15y agoAnd do what when they get there?
- maaku 15y agoIt is, in fact, a heck of a lot more complicated than that. Mostly the U.S. went to the moon to provide civilian cover for R&D investments in I.C.B.M. and satellite surveillance technology. If you are interested I suggest reading "Red Moon Rising", which covers quite accurately the early players and their politics and motivations on both sides (from the V-2 in WW2 to Yuri Gagarin and Kennedy's declaration).
- william42 15y agoA google search gives a lot of results, but I think you mean this: http://www.amazon.com/Red-Moon-Rising-Sputnik-Rivalries/dp/080508147X http://www.amazon.com/Red-Moon-Rising-Sputnik-Rivalries/dp/0... Is this true?
- maaku 15y agoThe manuscript I read had a different cover, but I think it's the same book. And yes, it's true. I work at NASA and some of my managers were there as early as the Apollo program. The connection to the military is an open secret that is well-known but has always been divorced from the mythic of the space race. It wasn't until the players retired, memoirs were published, and the fall of the U.S.S.R. that historians were able to put the pieces into a cohesive whole, telling the story from both sides. Matthew Brzezinski draws upon this more recent research for the book.
- MichaelApproved 15y agoThe resources required to build and send a rocket into space are very expensive. A lot of money would be going to something like rocket fuel instead of a paycheck. You'd revitalize the economy if you spent money on projects that had a better ratio of jobs created to dollars spent.
- Volpe 15y agoThat's right, because rocket fuel just comes out of a vending machine. There are a lot of jobs behind the extraction and refinement of rocket fuel.
- MichaelApproved 15y agoMore jobs are created in other manufacturing and construction jobs. Better value for the money elsewhere is my point.
- Cushman 15y agoWhy the obsession with creating "jobs"? I'd rather be investing in robots that eliminate manual labor and paying people for more intellectual pursuits.