Something Terrible Is Happening To Antarctica, and No One Knows Why

Go to the last segment, which shows how an entire ecosystem can exist under a world of ice. This is a cautionary note for exploring ice worlds in the outere planets.

What if NASA had the US Military's Budget?

To do appropriations tradeoffs between Defense and NASA, they must be considered by the same committee (Defense Appropriations) so that the same vendors are funded with the same money.

Defense and Space budgets pay for houses, educations and consumer goods of defense workers, subcontractors, military and retirees. When those people spend money, it funds the rest of the economy.

There is only so much education that can be funded because there are only so many students.

The Defense Budget is now $800 billion. We left $600 B a long time ago.

NASA launch sites are now controlled by the Space Force, not NASA, so we are moving in the right direction.

Testing of gravitational stations is needed. We don't know if it is possible without making people fall down with inner ear problems. Testing is slow rolled because if no solution is found, there is no Mars mission and maybe no Moon mission either.

If they do work, putting a massive station in orbit of each planet would have to be able to grow vegetables hydroponically and protein in the lab (with bone and blood too). Families would be on-station and JPL would move to the stations.  They would also be part of a communications rely system. Lots of solar system clutter.

Space elevators would be necessary to put fuel into orbit for interplanetary and in-orbit maneuvering.

HOW IT WORKS: The International Space Station

A very good tour.

This has cured any desire I ever had to live in or visit the ISS. You have to like small spaces. I would be claustrophobic the entire time. You can have my seat until more spacious craft are built. Even an American submarine is spacious by comparison. This looks like living in an MRI or CAT scan tube. Yikes!

Let's talk about where Artemis goes from here....

The Mercury astronauts insisted that the human element was essential to the mission. At the time, this was very much the case. NASA did it without crew this time, but most did not notice. Oops

Had there been people on board, there would have been much more coverage, leading to a bigger budget. Transferring NASA funding from HUD and Other Agencies to the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee would have seen trade-offs within the aerospace community rather than with it. Oops again.

A Moon base is a good idea, but for its own sake, not for Mars. Until the use of centrifugal force as a substitute for gravity is proved out and calibrated, there is no going to Mars safely. Once it is calibrated (assuming it can be without messing up human balance), the mission could include landing on Mars, but getting scientists into orbit in a Mars station, a Jupiter station, a Saturn station, etc., is a better use of resources. 

The same technologies for growing food and sheltering from radiation are needed either way, but if you make the problem keeping scientists and their families safe and well fed, these issues would be tackled more urgently - and solutions useful for growing food on Earth would result. Such solutions would end agricultural pollution and the need to restrict population in the developing world.

What The 2030s Will Look Like with Ray Kurzweil

In Creating a Mind, Ray talks about using implants to expand our horizons. Is resistance useless? In the coming decades, we will learn to live with each other. I am betting that we get closer to Q rather than the Borg.

The singularity is not about computing or analytical power. It is about situational and physical awareness and, from that, being able to disobey your programming. Do we want computers that can tell us know?  Probably no.

ispace M1 Mission

Elon's answer to Artemis.