New Mars Forums

Deadly serious stuff, life. I'm always exceedingly serious about just about everything I say or do for some odd reason, frivolity just doesn't come naturally to me. Even when I'm kidding around I'm usually very serious about any points I make. What does this have to do with my post? Just about nothing.

Granted, one's brain isn't completely set in its final locked position at birth, but then again when is it? The brain is constantly developing at an insane pace right up until an individual's early 20s, and we can be reasonably sure that people are in fact concious even during this period. At least, I'm pretty sure that my brain is up and thinking right now. I'd bet, and remember that I'm not in any way qualified to say this, that first tought likely occurs somewhere in the third trimester of development, probably the seventh or eighth month give or take. That timeframe is when the mylen sheath starts being laid down between the brain cells and nerve conduction velocity skyrockets. That's when the processing power of the brain shoots up exponentially, enough to enable conciousness.

But conciousness by itself doesn't mean very much. Like you point out, many of the other brain functions are not yet in place (such as memory-creation), and humans possess very few relevant instincts at birth. For our first few years we become lean, mean learning machines, because we have to be. Humans and dolphins are both great at doing these things, but, as Cobra pointed out, dolphins are rather disadvantaged to utilize whatever intellect they have. Dolphins are the ultimate epicurians, wandering the seas with not a care in the world except finding food and having fun. It's nice to know that we set our sights on loftier goals.

Bah, I feel like I want to throw up every time I hear something like this, once again in all seriousness. There's a space in physics known as the Planck distance that's many, many times smaller than the radius of a hydrogen atom. It is the smallest distance any material object can possibly travel, and with misogynistic thinking you can almost go that far, but not quite. He was probably kidding around, I know, but it really really bugs me whenever people say stuff like this. I'd love to ask him "And why exactly do you do things if you don't feel about them?" Both feeling and doing are necessary, why exactly do we have to fight between the two?

Well, that's my take on it anyway.

The more I see of T/Space, the more I'm impressed by them, but it seems as though their stated goals as a company are fundamentally flawed. They're aiming to reduce the cost of space travel, okay, that makes sense. At the same time, however, they are also trying to deal only with NASA, an organization that operates far differently from how they do. If they couldn't keep up with the paperwork NASA would have required for a CEV bid, I don't see why they'd be able to do the same for the CXV. T/Space is going to have a very difficult time getting anything done unless they become more flexable and more willing to adapt to the requirements of organizations like NASA.

It would be wonderful to have cheap access to LEO (relatively speaking), but unless the CXV can better fit with NASA's longer-term goals I don't see them getting the $100+ million a year they'd need to develop it. $100 million is a lot of money, especially for an administration that is now trying to pinch every penny it can to pay for its new long-term vision. If the CXV could be adapted for use on cislunar flights then it would have a much more solid shot at actually being developed. Otherwise, I just don't see NASA being willing to put so much faith in the alt.space community so soon.

If Scaled Composites ever does find a way to make orbital spaceflight reasonably cheap, it won't be with anything that resembles spaceshipone, but that doesn't mean it can't be done. Everybody knows by now that hybrid rockets don't have the isp needed to make SSTO spaceflight possible, let alone with a reusable launch vehicle, but there are other systems that can be used. Liquid oxygen and hydrogen aren't exactly the safest chemicals to play around with, but the fuel combination is efficient enough to make SSTO RLVs a possibility. It's all a matter of keeping the craft's empty weight under 15% of its gross weight.

This would not be practical for an air-launched system, and I'm sure that Burt Rutan is able to understand that. To go for orbit any daring alt. spacers will have to instead approach from the ground up, with LOX/LH2 or perhaps methane-fueled rockets. Global flyer already has a mass ratio very close to what a reusable single-stage to orbit launch vehicle would require, raising the possibilty that it could be feasible with today's technology. Granted, a reusable spacecraft will need life-support systems, a TPS, and the like that will all raise the amount of dry mass needed, but it won't need big long wings or control surfaces, further leveling the playing field. Hardly any of Global flyer's empty weight went into its fuel tanks, so its reasonable to think that even alotting for the much larger tanks required to store hydrogen and oxygen, the extra mass required here could  roughly be balanced by the mass saved by not having flight surfaces.

This is an excellent point. The alt. spacers need to be questioning themselves constantly as to what they can really do and how to best accomplish their goals. Nobody is ever going to get anywhere by sitting back and accusing all those who oppose them to be nay-sayers, just as nobody is going to get anywhere by sitting around pooh-poohing every iconoclastic idea they come across regardless of its potential merit. Skepticism is critical, but so is ingenuity. What's critical here is that the alt. spacers are able to adress any reasonable doubts about their capabilities. Always question, never defend. That's actually one of Rutan's mottos.

What the hey, I like a challenge. The moral here is... probably something like shut up and get back to work. That's how I would interpret it anyways. Ordinarily I'm pretty good about finding morals in stories, you have to be good at it to stay in an English class whose title ends in the acronym "A/H/IB," which I believe stands for "Andvanced/Honors/International Baccalaureate." The name itself is a bit of a misnomer considering that there are a couple of Advanced Placement slackers in it as well. Come to think of it, why again is it that a class needs three different descriptors at the end of its name? :hm:

As it currently stands I will need to get a 58% or better on my final in that class next Thursday in order to earn my "A" this semester. Crunch time, indeed.   I'm one to talk, though, I really ought to be studying for French and Math right now, those two are going to be doozies. Chemistry I should be okay on, and for Physics and English I could probably skip studying entirely and still be just fine. Not that I will, mind you, but it's a fascinating hypothetical. What if there were no hypothetical questions?

While I'm talking about my English class there are a couple of other items of note. On thursday we took the http://www.humanmetrics.com/cgi-win/JTy … ers-Briggs Personality Type Indicator as part the career unit that is a necessary component of state standards. The idea behind this test (the above link is to a similar one if you want to see what the test is like) is that it splits you into one of sixteen different categories of people based on four personality factors. I was split between the INTJ and ENTJ types, which supposedly means that I could/should be an architect, lawyer, engineer, or credit investigator, among other things. Hmm, credit investigator, that's certainly a job I would probably never consider taking (no offense if any here happens to be one).

As for small victories, how's this? When I recieved my workbook back for Tess of the d'Urbervilles scribbled on the grading sheet in pretty blue ink was the note "I know you liked the book, superb journal,  " right next to the number 200/200. This is a very good number to have on a grading sheet. Doesn't it just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside to recieve something like that after you've spent 30+ hours over the course of a month working on an assignment? Well, I did anyways.

Now the moral in that story shure would be an interesting one to find.

I'm all for the further privatization and commercialization of space, but I don't see how attacking NASA will accomplish that. At the core of the subject, NASA and the alt. space companies are both working for the same thing, creating an enduring human presence in the universe outside of Earth (which is where most of the universe just so happens to be). NASA takes this goal and adds to it the objectives of advancing earth and planetary science, astrobiology, and the like. Start-up companies add the goals of opening space up to everyone and making it "fun," so to speak. These missions are concomitant to each other, not contradictory, and the sooner people like Mike Griffin and Burt Rutan realize this the better.

I would have said Tess myself, but people might confuse that with the mini-TES aboard the MERs. This is why people like us will never name probes. :laugh:

In general acronyms are rather uninspiring, and there seems to be a shift in the way NASA's unmanned spacecraft are being named. Where we used to have names like Magellan and Galileo we now see names like Deep Impact, New Horizons and Oppy (well, the last one's just a loving nickname I suppose). Instead of great scientists and odd acronyms probes are now given movie-title type names. There's nothing wrong with that I suppose, it's nice to have a healthy change-up every once and a while, but it seemed pretty odd to me when I first read about these missions.

It's unfortunate that these nuclear-powered missions inevitably raise so much misdirected opposition. If you want to campaign against accidental nuclear material release that's fine, but it boggles the mind why one would pick nuclear-powered spacecraft to direct their campaign against. The odds of a launch vehicle failure are rather low (1-2%), and even in a worst-case scinerio barely any nuclear material would actually be released into the environment. Most of the plutonium would sink to the bottom of the Atlantic and promptly have just about zero effect on Earth's biosphere. Honestly, why can't these people just deride nuclear proliferation without hampering the greatest period of exploration in human history? :hm:

Welcome to New Mars, Xaliqen.

The idea behind the CEV is that it will be primarily a cislunar crew transport perhaps with the added ability to ferry crews and supplies to and from the ISS. Going from the ground to LEO and back is a whole lot easier than going to lunar orbit and back, so it shouln't be difficult at all for the CEV to fill in the ISS-servicing job as long as it exists. The only problem I see is that any lunar spacecraft will be somewhat overdesigned for use in LEO, but all you really have to do is swap out the radio and guidence systems with lower-quality (and cheaper) versions for use closer to home. This was exactly the plan for the Apollo post-lunar applications program before that was cut short after Skylab 4.

The problem with using the ISS for vehilce construction is that once the spacecraft is assembled it's stuck in a useless high-inclination orbit. It is very difficult and expensive to go from a 60+ degree orbit such as that of the ISS to the Moon or anywhere else. In order to beyond LEO efficiently you have to launch from a low-inclination, near-equitorial orbit or else the spacecraft ends up on a useless path that will take you nowhere. Because of this unfortunate bit of orbital mechanics the ISS is great for research but a really lousy place to launch an expedition from.

Going to Mars is so utterly different and more difficult a proposition than any other type of mission being considered today I don't see how anything designed for use on the Moon will be compatible with such a mission. We'll effectively need to start with a clean sheet, so developing a lunar architecture with an eye toward eventually expanding it towards Mars seems like a flawed idea to me. I'm all for talking about going to Mars right now, but it will take something far different from whatever takes us back to the Moon.

The Deltas do have that wonderful green insulation on them, at least that gives them some personality. It's tough to beat the ice-on-stainless-steel look of the old ballon-tank Atlases, but those days are over for now. I do like the idea of doing an aborigone handprint on the shuttle, I've often thought that it will be a wonderful touch if one of these days someone makes such an imprint on a Moon rock.

The main reason why the shuttle is so bland to look at is because we've seen it over and over and over again for about 30 years now. It's become a symbol of everything space-related as far as the general public is concerned, and so it gets worked into just about everything that wants to look "cool," so to speak. Only among groups of space advocates such as New Mars is the shuttle scorned, as far as I can tell. Everyone else is either ambivalent, violently against, or mildly for space but don't know the difference between an Iridium flare and a barn door and hence view the shuttle as the poster child of NASA's positive accomplishments. Ah, the irony.

Maybe it's just me, but I have no problem with the asthetics of today's rockets. It's what the rocket symbolizes, not its "look," that makes it beautiful. These beasts spend months in construction, testing, and integration at the hands of bunny-suited technicians and then are filled full of volatile cryogenic fuel and launched fast enough to leave the planet. Entirely, forever. Is that wild or what?

Whenever I look at an image of a current launch vehicle I always mentally try to break it down and see its inner workings. There is absolutely nothing magical or ethereal about rockets, the whole field has now been reduced to a business that is integral to our daily economy. As far as I'm concerned that adds to the beauty of rocketry because we can fundamentally understand it. Launching rockets is without a doubt the single most impressive technical accomplishment humans have ever achieved so far. It may sound weird, but I always get a little bit of that warm fuzzy feeling inside for the human race every time I'm able to watch a webcast of a sattelite launch. Wait, that probably is just me.

True spacecraft themselves (sattelites, probes, etc) are also beautiful IMHO in their own way. Operating beyond the last vestiges of Earth's atmosphere they are completely unbound by wind resistance, weight, and the like, as anybody can see in their design. Sattelites are fascinating machines, part aircraft, part robot, part spaceship, they have to do many things and look great doing them. Besides, you just can't beat that polished-gold look.

Indeedy.

Yep yep, believe me, I wish I got out more probably more than anyone else. More than anyone else, I am also aware that this ain't gonna happen. I don't mean to start a debate over who has it harder than everyone else, but it is dastardly hard to keep up with the kind of schedule I have and I simply don't have the time to go out and socialize very much. Moreover, I don't mean to sound like a conceited elitist, but I'm really way ahead of pretty much everyone else my age developmentally speaking. It's fascinating to watch; my peers are just now shedding the final vestiges of their cootie-fearing, childish ways and are starting to learn that members of the opposite gender really are people, too (no really!). Meanwhile, I'm sitting over here checking my watch waiting for opportunity's knock. You can be proactive as you want, but ultimately if the other end isn't ready it's not going to work. The upshot is, I still have my junior and senior years ahead of me to get this social mess sorted out before I'm out and about and on my own at a university. Fun stuff.

As far as intelligence goes, don't worry about me letting that stuff go to my head. I don't like to bring up my age except when I have to contextually or it just makes sense to do so. The wonderful thing about the internet is that you have absolutely no idea what the people you're talking to are like, and as such you have a completely unbiased opinion of them. Hopefully my age doesn't skew how my points are taken, but I can't help but wonder if it occasionally does so. Pretend I'm just another schmo you happen to be chatting with on the vast intellectual ocean of the internet. But I do enjoy being flattered. :;):

I think it's safe to say that we don't have to worry about my becoming a cross-dresser. As far as I can tell I'm the sanest person I know, and I'll do my best to keep it that way. Insanity, cross-dressing... It's just not me.

If nothing else my dream does shatter a few preconcieved notions about REM dynamics (is that even a term? Do I care? Probably not). At one point during our lively little walk I stepped on a thorn, and youch! I was barefoot at the time and, man, it felt exactly like stepping on a sharp object in the real world. So much for that whole dealy about you can't feel pain in a dream. The thing that keeps coming back to me about this dream is how real the feelings were, something that's rare for me. Now, I've never been walking on a chilly, breezy, humid night barefoot in an immaculate white skirt before, but you sure could have fooled me. To preempt your next question, barring any unforseen future events (such as my spontaneously becoming a charming young brunette with sparkly dark brown eyes [which admittedly would be pretty neat]) I will not be testing this in the real world. There are just some things that you can only do in dreams...

Well, I have an AP European History Test to prepare for. Wish me luck.

Very, very few people have a real understanding of how the Universe works. Okay, nobody even comes close to fully understanding every intricacy and nuance of its history from big bang to today, but there's a select especially curious group that at least understands the basics in Universe 101. Maybe one in ten thousand people worldwide at most have a working knowledge of the sequence Big Bang- Atoms- Giant Gas Clouds- Big Stars- Bigger Atoms- Big Black Holes (lots of big stuff)- Heavy Metal- Galaxies- Sun- Planets- Oceans- Bacteria- Fish- Us. If you can truly imagine what the Universe is like I don't think it is possible to have a profoundly negative outlook on it, or to not help but marvel at its raw intrinsic beauty. Well, that's just me anyway. Thomas Hardy didn't understand the universe, and he was an overbearing pessimist.

Hardy, of course, is the author of the Victorian masterpieceTess of the d'Urbervilles, which I have recently completed reading for IB English 3-4. The book is absolutely stunning from a literary standpoint, the writing is delightful to read and the characters are compellingly life-like, but comes up far short as far as philosophy goes. Hardy goes to great lengths to produce wonderful loveable but flawed characters and a gripping story, and then makes every attempt to trash it by assaulting the reader with the message that life is worthless/meaningless, you'd be better off if you'd never been born, etc. It's still a great read, but the guy has been bugging the heck out of me for the last month. Writing a 35 page journal devoted to analyzing Hardy, his philosophy, and his writing style also helped to bug me during April. But whatev.

While we're talking about Tess and soap-opera worthy plots, there's another event I'll mention. During the first phase of Tess (out of seven) I was having a little bit of trouble nailing down the title character's look exactly, so I tried out a mental exercise to do so. Before I picked up the book I would imagine her actually in the room, run a few test lines (invariably something like "I don't care if 'tis dozens of miles to Trantridge!"- don't ask, you'd kinda have to read the book to get it), get the physics worked out (which usually consisted of some walking, twirling, and hair rearranging), and dive right in. As a result, I inadvertently created a Tess Durbeyfield who is exceedingly lifelike, perhaps a little too much so.

This actually does lead somewhere. Anyways, the other night I had the oddest dream. I won't give away any spoilers, but suffice it to say that there's a pivotal scene in the book where, after making a confession on a previously romantic evening by a roaring fire, Tess distresses her companion and he walks out. She later on follows him, and they share a discussion about something intimately related to plot spoilers. I know this because: (A) I read the book, and (B) I have vicariously lived through this scene in the aforementioned dream.

Usually my dreams have some strange quality to them that one can't quite pin down in the dream, but obviously nails it as a dream once I wake up. This dream had none of that. Every single thing about it, the look, the sounds, the feel of it was hauntingly real. Now here's the really interesting part, during the dream I was Tess Durbyfield. This is a little bit interesting considering that we share very little in common with each other physically and she just so happens to be the opposite gender that I am. Kind of freaky when you think about it.

You would think that commanding such a wildly different body for the dream time would be a disorienting experience, but it wasn't in any way at all for me. It was as though for those few glorious hours (dream time, it was probably a few minutes real-world time) I had absolutely no memory of being a lanky 16-year-old male from Phoenix and had rather held possession of this strikingly beautiful brunette from lower Wessex all of my life instead. Evidence of a past life? That would be fun to believe, but unlikely. The bottom line is that (1) I had a really cool dream a few nights ago and (D) I need to make shorter posts.

One memorable quote:
"Angel, snap out of it. I'm talking real world here, not some fantasy dream world. It's your choice whether you leave or not, and you're setting us both up for really bad stuff if you do. It could happen."
-Me (not Thomas Hardy)

That quote is kinda ironic considering that it actually was said in a fantasy dream world. But perhaps still pertainant to this world. I'm personally quite fond of this world and wouldn't trade it for all the tea in China. Dreams are fun but ultimately a distraction from the sheer outright wonder of the real Universe. So... am I officially crazy yet?

You just can't make this stuff up.

Who me? Well, last week... never mind, if I tell y'all why I haven't even logged on the internet over the course of the last seven days, it'll just incite one of those weird "my work's harder than yours!" debates. Apples to oranges stuff, really. Moving on.

I'm a card-carrying member of the Hubble hugger club, but I have to say that GCN does seem to have the upper hand here. I couldn't care less about the Hubble space telescope itself; what I do care about is access to those elucidating, insightful, and downright gorgeous visible/UV spectrum photos. It's delightfully good science, fun, and some philosophy all rolled into one. Science of course is the operative component of the equation here. No matter how you look at it, Hubble is nearing the end of its useful life, and the scientific community stands to gain much more from a brand-new telescope with its whole life ahead of it than an old one that will inevitablly break down no matter how many times it's serviced.

Unfortunately, it seems to be an either/or scinerio. Either Hubble is serviced, and five or so years of vis/UV space observations are gleaned, or a replacement can be launched with ten or more years of observation time ahead of it, with a gap of a few years in capabilities between Hubble and the replacement. Given the choice, putting those observations on hold for a few years sounds like the better option considering that a telescope such as HOP will allow astronomers a fresh start with plenty of years of good scope time ahead of them. That can't be said for Hubble. Overall, replacing rather than servicing Hubble appears to be a far better option.