Space Shuttle.

[Feraud]

hatflick1's comments started me thinking...

I agree we should try to conserve fossil fuels, save our environment, etc.
There is a problem in trying to do that. The old "us" versus "them" conflict. By "Them" I mean business people. Are they Human, Patriotic, or responsible in any way? Capitalism is great but does it look to anyone like business supercedes all else?? Is it fair for only the citizens of a country to have consciences while leaders conduct 'business as usual'? I would not object to us having political and economic objectives but fooling people into thinking this is a Democratice or life threatening situation is irresponsible. After all, we are the 'collateral damage' as a result of political and economic interference in other countries.

Our so-called "Leaders" in the U.S. are putting the fear of God into its citizens with these terrorist color alerts. The media reads like these terrorists, the new "Commies" btw, are infesting our country waiting to strike.

Meanwhile, business is skipping along at a brisk and productive gait. How can we be told to support a war based on ideas of Democracy and Freedom when our leaders appear to put business interests at the top of their priority list? What does Patriotism mean when we deal with countries that appear suspiciously against our way of life?

Citizens are not blameless but certainly our "Leaders" are not setting good examples.....

 

[android]

Just to put things into perspective.

You go out and have a really great meal. The bill is $200.
You're a cheap ba***rd so you leave a 1 cent tip.

That's the NASA budget for FY06, $16.5B out of $2472B.

Oh, and your brother in law's meal came to $36 of the $200. That's the Defense budget.

 

[zeus36]

Meanwhile, business is skipping along at a brisk and productive gait. How can we be told to support a war based on ideas of Democracy and Freedom when our leaders appear to put business interests at the top of their priority list? What does Patriotism mean when we deal with countries that appear suspiciously against our way of life?

Citizens are not blameless but certainly our "Leaders" are not setting good examples.....

Check out the movie Fahrenheit 911 for some interesting information on our government's business ties with Saudi Arabia, especially the elected officials who are business partners with that country and board members of companies profiting from the war.

I do consider my views to the right, but I tried to watch with an open mind...

 

[jamespowers]

All of these problems can be controlled by getting government morons out of the way. Haven't you fellows noticed that this tile stuff wasn't happening until recently? Ever wonder why? Well I can tell you why. OSHA tells NASA that their tiles formerly made of Freon are not longer going to be produced. Freon based tiles worked finebut they went on to try something else. How good was it? Lousy as you can see. Screw up number one based on bureaucratic stupidity.
You want lower dependency on foreign oil? Ok. We can fix that too. The problem is that there are groups and people here and there who are completely apoplectic over nuclear power. They don't want it and are deathly afraid of it while it produces clean and efficient power in europe (one thing europe can do right---for once). France is even building more. Second we have plenty of oil offshore here and up in Alaska but again we have people and pressure groups who keep us from utilizing it. They don't want a view obstructed or even a drip of oil in the water or environment. These are all fine but they contribute to our foreign entanglements and do not complain about high gas costs or such entanglements if you are part of the problem. The minimal environmental risk might be cheaper in the long run than foreign entanglements.
Now let's not forget that the shuttle got back just fine---luckily.

Regards to all,

J

 

[Miss Neecerie]

.
Now let's not forget that the shuttle got back just fine---luckily.

J

Thankfully they came back....not luckily.....luck would have been -not- spending many many hours reengineering all the parts that had problems, and still making it back safe.

Having teams of engineers work on this for 2 and a half years so that -most- of the problems were either fixed or able to be better assessed while in flight...thats not luck...thats hard work by the teams of engineers.

I just so happen to work for one of the major subcontractors to NASA, on the shuttle program, and so I know just how much hard work our team has put into making sure the work we did, accomplished the goals that were set out.

ps. I don't work for the foam manufacturer, so pointing out that the same foam failed, well, I don't know enough about their processes to comment.

 

[scotrace]

Ten Cheers!

And more pats on the back. I have a friend who does work for NASA. I know it's huge and worthwhile work.

Glad everyone's smarts and hard work brought them home safely.

 

[Feraud]

Check out the movie Fahrenheit 911 for some interesting information on our government's business ties with Saudi Arabia, especially the elected officials who are business partners with that country and board members of companies profiting from the war.

I do consider my views to the right, but I tried to watch with an open mind...

I did see Fahrenheit 911 and was appalled by it! Michael Moore made this film look like a personal vendetta against the Bush family. I do not deny the existence of the alleged business ties, but Moore irresponsibly tried to make it look like the Bush family was responsible for the September 11th terrorist act! The problem with Michael Moore is he is willing to lie and 'creatively edit' his films to make a point. When you do that you are as bad as those you rail against. What I see is the more you know about a subject from a Moore film, the more he comes off like a spoiled brat.

People to the Right consider me too Left, those to the Left consider me too Right. I guess that makes me perfect!

I am glad our Astronauts make it back home safe!

 

[Feraud]

A far superior documentary is Bush's Brain. Real insight into our current vacationing president who really just wanted to be the commisioner of baseball until Karl Rove arrived and gave him an X-treme makeover.

Thanks for the film tip.

 

[Feraud]

I put the movie on my Netflix account. I will give it a watch.

 

[PrettyBigGuy]

Chaos & Complexity

I am currently reading a book called "Deep Survival" by Laurence Gonzales. My sister recommended it because it not only gives accounts of how people cope when put into survival situations, but it also explains the science of why some people survive and why some do not. It's very interesting and I gaurantee you will triple check all your preporations before entering the wilderness.
Anyway, in the chapter I just finished, the author talked about the Columbia accident and why it happened. It all boils down to complex systems. He goes on to say that "NASA will investigate and explain all the details of how it happened, but knowing those details will not prevent the next accident. Indeed, the safety precautions they take may make it more likely." I take this to mean that the Space Shuttle is already a complex system that has a pretty small margin for error. Building in more safety precautions just make it more complex!
The author also quotes Dan Canin, a Lockheed engineer who wrote an email that said: " Every precaution and material science known to man has been applied to the problem of making the thermal protection system work. It's a known risk. The tiles are soft, and every astronaut knows that if the wrong ones are damaged, the shuttle burns up. But the odds against it are pretty good, especially when compared to the rewards of being an astronaut, so they're willing to take the chance. In fact, they FIGHT for it...as would a lot of us. But getting the public to buy this is a lot tougher, especially a public that expects every risk in their lives to be mitigatable to zero. It will be interesting to see if NASA tries to take on this challange, explaining to the public that doing bold things isn't about engineering risk to zero. Sh** happens, and if we just want to restrict ourselves to things where sh** can't happen...we're not going to do anything very interesting."
I find this quote very compelling and I also agree that space travel should be opened up to the private sector. It's my opinion that as horrible as accidents like Challenger and Columbia were, they wouldn't have been such a "national tragadies" if they weren't funded by goverment agencies. Think of it this way, How often is it world news when a test pilot crashes who works for Lockheed or Northrop? Also I'm not trying to trivialize the deaths of our astronauts, I'm just trying to say that they knew the risks when they took them and if we could ask any of them now I'm sure that they would say that it was worth it.