From: Dr. Norman J. LaFave <lafave@ial4.jsc.nasa.gov>
Subject: Re: Democrat == Loony Left??? (was Re: Christiani
X-Xxdate: Thu, 31 Dec 92 08:45:20 GMT
Organization: Lockheed Engineering & Sciences Company
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1.1d12
Date: Thu, 31 Dec 1992 14:49:02 GMT

In article <C03nLM.Fup@unix.portal.com> mike myke schwartz,
mykes@shell.portal.com writes:
>This is an utterly emotional argument that disregards the most obvious.
>Space is not any kind of frontier.  It has been explored

It has? I'm glad to know that I can stop working because
absolutely everything about space is known already....   :-/

>and what we know
>is that it is not inhabited by life,

Untrue. Space is big and we have no proof either way as yet.

>uninhabitable by humans without adding
>extraordinary cost to the proposition,

The operative words here are "at present".

>and incredibly finite due to our
>technical inability to go very far.

See operative words above....

>Exploration of space requires a huge
>amount of costly technology,

Same operative words.... I'm beginning to see a pattern here....

>while exploration of the new world was possible
>using existing technology - sailing ships, canoes, backpacks, sleeping
bags,
>and rifles.

Here's a clue Mike: Rockets ARE existing technology. Here's another
clue: Arguements like yours are inherently flawed because they assume
no advances in technology. Do you really think that the shuttle is the
be all/end all of all space transportation systems? There are
development programs as we speak to make access to space routine
and two orders of magnitude cheaper. If it were 100 years earlier, you
would probably be spewing similar flawed arguements pertaining to
pracical human flight.

>
>That said, I repeat that unmanned space exploration makes a lot of sense,
>is much cheaper, gets a lot more bang to the buck, allows us to look at
>weather patterns, gather intelligence data, look out into space from
beyond
>the atmosphere, build maps of entire planets, and so on.

And robots still can't accomplish a small fraction of the tasks of a human
being. Robot spacecraft are not as flexible, do not adapt well, have
trouble
fixing themselves (Galileo, HST), .... Robots have to come a hell of alot
farther
technologically before they can match a human being. Admittedly, they
have provided us with a spectacular amount of data, but according to many
scientists I have talked to, this data is a teaser and they would have
loved
to have supplemented it on the fly when a significant
phenomenon was observed but were unable to do so
because the programming is difficult to alter.
 
>
>I also repeat that Star Trek is a fantasy.  We have no ability to travel 
>at 9x the speed of light, and all scientific evidence is that it is
simply
>impossible.

I am a Relativist and I don't make statements
like this because it is foolish to do so.

>
>: Also, there will be poor always.  I see no reason why we must
subordinate our
>: need to achieve human excellence or our scientific curiousity to the
plight
>: of the poor.  First of all, utopianism is unrealistic (curing poverty)
and,
>: secondly, we have a right (and a duty to our children) to make our
society
>: succede.
>: 
>
>This is incredibly pessimistic.  Poor is a relative term, and the
quality of
>life for the "poor" is clearly something we can and have been
continuously
>are improving...

Have you seen Somalia or Bangla Desh lately? Improving....  :-/

We will have much better luck achieving  a healthy, growing,
dynamic society and eliminating poverty if we stop being
a bunch of panty-waists, hording
our precious pennies while our world collapses around us. To
achieve this, we need to push the scientific and
technical envelope....to challenge ourselves....to make sacrifices in
order
to meet ambitious goals. Space exploration and exploitation is the most
promising frontier to direct our efforts in this regard. This society
became great because the dreamers ignored the naysayers like
yourself and pushed on. You may be happy making incremental
improvements to existing technology, playing leap frog with
our foreign competitors, watching sitcoms while we decline as
a nation, but I am not.

"You will pay for your lack of vision"

Norman

Dr. Norman J. LaFave
Senior Engineer
Lockheed Engineering and Sciences Company




When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro
                               Hunter Thompson
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