Finally, a sensible solution to the Hubble debate - ... that we can all agree on...maybe.

Martian Republic · 2005-02-26 21:35:12

CGNR: Re. "Hardly, your pitiful "realtivising" of this situation is nonsense... the choice between HST SM4 and HOP is obvious, self evident, and beyond any rational reproach. To support HST-SM4 is illogical, irrational, and anti-scientific."

You would have to do more than just send a shuttle up a mountain side to get enough speed to get into orbit. You would have to build a levitated rail system that fourteen to sixteen miles up in the air at about 45 degree angle. You would have to be able to execrate it at 1,500 miles an hour and the rail would have to be almost straight, because any twist or bend in the rail would throw too many "G's" on the shuttle. Since this would be twice to three times higher than the highest mountain you would have to build a major rails system to accomplish it. It would probably be in the fifteen to twenty billion dollar range even if it could be done. In theory we could build it with current technology, but you would have to dedicate about thirty to forty miles for the acceleration so you don't put too many "G's" on it and it would have to be straight too. The other part of the shuttle system would be to build the shuttle. Which would probably cost ten to twenty billion to develop and a billion dollars a copy if it can be done.

http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/a … glev2.html

Larry,

GCNRevenger · 2005-02-26 22:56:34

Hence the use of quotation marks dicktice, as it is not a common word. My point is, that HST vs HOP is a clear-cut and dried case, that there is no room for debate on which is the better scientific investment. Your parody of my statement is silly because, obvisouly, a railgun-assisted launch vehicle is not anything like this situation.

I use the term anti-scientific because the decision to try and "save" Hubble is exactly that. It is not merely unscientific, it is actually activly damaging to the science of astronomy to spend so much money to use Shuttle to try and fix it... when that same money would buy a brand new superior telescope instead.

SpaceNut · 2005-02-28 06:05:36

I agree that the HOP is a better bargain versus the HST and SM4 repairs for the cost, but why must it take the so long to get such a mission onto the next rocket to orbit before Hubble comes down?

dicktice · 2005-02-28 11:34:39

M-R: The idea re. rail lanching up the side of an equitorial strato-volcano is merely to save the weight and fuel used to get a conventional, 3-stage vehicle up to around 20,000 feet, the remaining stage(s) admittedly still subsonic, but the railcar 1st stage replacement reuseable, using railway switching to get it out of the way for the next (already checked out) checked-out vehicle's launch-window. What, aside from the obvious political objections, is wrong with eliminating the weight to launch vertically, to go supersonic velocity at (?) pressure altitude where the air is denser than at the top of the volcano?

GCNRevenger · 2005-02-28 12:04:29

Again, the air density doesn't mean very much, nor does gaining only 20,000ft of the acent to orbit.

The cost to achieve the tiny weight savings from such an idea would easily be canceld out by the cost of building the railgun.

dicktice · 2005-02-28 12:18:05

Hence the use of quotation marks dicktice, as it is not a common word. My point is, that HST vs HOP is a clear-cut and dried case, that there is no room for debate on which is the better scientific investment. Your parody of my statement is silly because, obvisouly, a railgun-assisted launch vehicle is not anything like this situation.
I use the term anti-scientific because the decision to try and "save" Hubble is exactly that. It is not merely unscientific, it is actually activly damaging to the science of astronomy to spend so much money to use Shuttle to try and fix it... when that same money would buy a brand new superior telescope instead.

Okay, GCNR, but what does "realtivising" mean?
HST vs HOP: No argument, but adding an "e" to the latter, for Experimental, making it HOPE, might be appropriate, but I jest.
Parody, regarding acronyms I assume? No, it was on the news: that acronyms, contrary to their original intent back in FDR's first administration in the 1930's, have proliferated out of all proportion to their intended utility. Canadaian government publications are spelling-out the original organization, etc. names when they occur the first time, before using the acronym throughout the rest of an article intended for general publication. E.g., I can't remember what HOP means, but in context with HST (which I do) by inference, it must mean a follow-on space telescope of some kind. If I didn't know that, your remark remains gobbledygook to someone brousing for the first time, and thus a wasted effort on your part. I implore you to spell-out more, because a lot of your stuff would appear to have substance for the rest of us.
Anti-scientific, makes me think of Creationism, etc. Purposeful avoidance of scientific method, in other words.
My feeling is that the Hubble HST should remain in service as long as it takes for the HOPE (sorry) to become operational.
Anti-science, come to think of it, would apply to the legislating of funds specifically to shut down the Hubble while it's still operational, and/or cutting off funds (to "save money") that support facilities and personnel who keep it running for the astronomer clients who count on it remaining in operation.

dicktice · 2005-02-28 12:49:28

Again, the air density doesn't mean very much, nor does gaining only 20,000ft of the acent to orbit.
The cost to achieve the tiny weight savings from such an idea would easily be canceld out by the cost of building the railgun.

I'd sure like to see a calculation of what that "tiny" saving in overall launch mass would turn out to be. (Please forget the one-off cost of such an international launch complex. I would compare it to the Panama Canal, but let's leave that for another thread.)

GCNRevenger · 2005-02-28 13:15:10

I feel I have done nothing inappropriate in using a coined word based on a common one, it is not my fault that you didn't put "relative" and "-ivising" together to mean "making something relative to another thing." If the Canadians started making me spell out scientific acronyms ("PnBuMA" rather then Poly-normal-butyl-methacrylate or PES rather then Poly-ether-sulfone or XRD rather then X-Ray Diffraction Crystallography) then papers would get unessesarrily long and be a waste of paper, since you would know what I was talking about if you were in my field.

"Anti-scientific, makes me think of Creationism, etc. Purposeful avoidance of scientific method, in other words.
My feeling is that the Hubble HST should remain in service as long as it takes for the HOPE (sorry) to become operational."

No, again when I say anti- I am using the term precisely. It is not simply the avoidance of the scientific method, but the active attempt to impede the science of astronomy. Funding any Hubble repair or life extension missions actively hurts astronomy since HOP is a much better deal.

There is, contrary to popular beliefe, no reason that astronomers will all lose their jobs or spontainiously combust if they don't have the use of a space telescope for a few years. It is not likly that HST can be kept alive long enough until HOP can be built without a Shuttle service... and while annoying as this is, it is simply trivial given all the extra years HOP will last versus HST. The stars will be there tomorrow.

"...makes me think of Creationism"

Speaking of which, there is no particular reason that Creationism is incompatible with science, but that is a matter for another thread...

dicktice · 2005-02-28 21:00:03

Well, what the heck, GCNR: I don't mind this harmless fencing going on a little longer if you don't (especially since we're still in New Posts), before returning to the real reason I'm here which concerns the planet Mars.

Now I get it, now: The remark [... your pitiful "relativising" of this situation is nonsense ...] coined an active verb (relativising) to accuse me of relativism (I looked it up) which relates all that can known about the relations between things. You give me too much credit, but thanks for the compliment.
Re. acronyms, my point exactly: Within your field, but outside at least one definition per, would speed up the reporting of across-discipline reporting.
HOP (whatever it is) isn't "a deal" until it exists. Meanwhile, at least keep on funding Hubble HST as long as it can produce basic scientific data, for analysis when it is gone, is all I ask, now that a repair, etc. mission seems to be dead.
I find your attitude towards the older Hubble astronomers callous, in the extreme, since it is not at all "trivial given all the extra years HOP will last versus HST not be kept alive long enough until HOP can be built ... given all the extra years HOP will last versus HST [since] the stars will be there tomorrow."
Finally: Your statement re. Creationism [there is no particular reason that Creationism is incompatible with science] leaves me absolutely speechless. Better that you start that other thread, because, suddenly I don't know where you're coming from.

Ian Flint · 2005-02-28 21:02:30

Hey, it may have already been mentioned, but has any money been allocated for a Hubble replacement?

GCNRevenger · 2005-02-28 21:26:37

Callous? Callousness has absolutely nothing to do with it and is an excelent example of your wrong-headed thinking about this topic. When considering any investment of this magnetude, which is one to one-point-five billion dollars and is a great deal of money, so emotion should have absolutely nothing to do with it and should purely be a cold and hard cost/return analysis.

HST should and will continue to be funded until its batteries or gyroscopes or electrical system finally give out, since that is a good investment. Spending $1,500,000,000 dollars and messing up the ISS schedule and risking the lives of a half-dozen astronauts in their irreplaceable Shuttle, all in order to make sure some astronomers will not be without a nearly obsolete space telescope for a few years is not. Especially not when that money is needed to build and launch Hubble's sucessor.

...Your statement re. Creationism [there is no particular reason that Creationism is incompatible with science] leaves me absolutely speechless."

Well, it isn't. Chances are you have based your conception about creationism from sources that don't think very highly of Christianity (or perhaps religions in general).

dicktice · 2005-03-01 10:14:06

Yep, yep and yep. So now let's bury the hatchet re. sentiments, and get back to the launch questions in whatever thread is appropriate, and on to Mars excursion life support. Nice to have intellectual discussions about the near future (mine) which in spite of everything (terrorism, politics as usual, etc.) is shaping up excitingly, as for instance, what we are doing right now, corresponding via this medium.

RobS · 2005-03-04 11:41:23

Have you all seen the article at Spacedaily.com about canceling the shuttle mission to Hubble? It turns out O'Keefe made the decision off the cuff and said there was a formal risk analysis when there wasn't! Furthermore, there were proposals for the shuttle to carry up a simple docking port so that if there was an emergency, another shuttle could dock to it (rather than the astronauts crossing between ships on a tether), and a proposal to launch an ACV like the European Jules Verne that will fly later this year, or the Japanese ACV, which would provide oxygen, water, and other supplies to the shuttle in case it had to wait for a rescue shuttle. The ACV would provide a kind of safe haven. Instead of pursuing a cheap docking module or an ACV, NASA pursued an expensive robotic repair option that was a waste of time and money! And now Congressmen are saying if NASA lied to us, why should we give them money to go to the moon and Mars? The article says the next Administrator will have to restore a Hubble service mission to restore the agency's credibility.

Whoever heard of that argument to serve Hubble: do it for political expediency to get the moon/Mars money.

-- RobS

Palomar · 2005-03-04 12:09:23

Have you all seen the article at Spacedaily.com about canceling the shuttle mission to Hubble? It turns out O'Keefe made the decision off the cuff and said there was a formal risk analysis when there wasn't!

*Oh good grief.

This situation just grows increasingly ridiculous. Either fix it or don't. How aggravating.

Guess I was out of the loop temporarily because last I heard they'd entirely nixed plans to send a shuttle repair mission.

And now we find O'Keefe lied?

And now Congressmen are saying if NASA lied to us, why should we give them money to go to the moon and Mars? The article says the next Administrator will have to restore a Hubble service mission to restore the agency's credibility.

Oh that's just great. Any excuse, huh? That's such flimsy, laughable "reasoning" IMO. Of course they're not going to just come out and say upfront they don't want to shell out the $ for a mission to Mars or back to the Moon again. But that's what they're getting at.

Whoever heard of that argument to serve Hubble: do it for political expediency to get the moon/Mars money.

Ridiculous. :down:

It's a miracle -anything- gets accomplished.

We could send men to the Moon multiple times...we can't fix a space telescope. What's wrong with this picture?

--Cindy

GCNRevenger · 2005-03-04 12:16:26

I have a different take on the matter...

That the general population have such a strong sentimental attachment to Hubble, that O'Keefe (rightly) wanted to minimize the PR damage when telling everyone that a Hubble mission was a bad idea if for no other reason then it is not worth repairing due to its age, design need for regular servicing, and superiority of a new space telescope.

So, I have no problems with O'Keefe's little white lie since the general populence would make a larger fuss over Hubble's demise, which would be bad for NASA... The public just sees zeros for the price tag and its all the same, since they expect space missions to be expensive.

"cheap docking module"

-No such thing as a cheap Shuttle modification
-Very questionable if rescue Shuttle could launch in time safely
-Adding extended supply systems to Shuttle would be complicated and expensive

"...and a proposal to launch an ACV like the European Jules Verne that will fly later this year, or the Japanese ACV, which would provide oxygen, water, and other supplies to the shuttle in case it had to wait for a rescue shuttle."

-Require radical alteration to the ACV and/or Shuttle to enable docking, or at least require addition of capture points on ACV and cargo bay umbilical interface on both vehicles
-ACV remains an unfinished, untested vehicle, and will not be available until Hubble will be out of time most likly. ACV will make its maiden shake-down flight in mid-2006, but a HST mission must fly in 2007 at latest.

And there is no such thing as a cheap Shuttle modification!

There are plenty of ideas to mitigate risk of a Shuttle service mission, the problem is that none of them are cheap and few of them are practical. None of them however change the underlying calculus, that a Hubble service mission is a bad investment. Period. Don't forget the disruption to ISS assembly schedule and would endanger the 2010 deadline too.

Edit:

"We could send men to the Moon multiple times...we can't fix a space telescope. What's wrong with this picture?"

Sure we can fix a space telescope... if it wern't almost twice as old as it was desinged to operate!

And the orbit makes such a big difference... Hubble is down low so Shuttle can service and upgrade it (and to have a reason for Shuttle), so it will require regular flights to keep it running no matter what (like this one), but the low orbit is also what runs down the batteries and gyros so quickly.

dicktice · 2005-03-04 18:17:02

GCNR wrote: "... So, I have no problems with O'Keefe's little white lie since the general populence [sic] would make a larger fuss over Hubble's demise, which would be bad for NASA ..."

How could you preface your reply with an elitist remark like that, when condoning such a lie would make your following reasoned remarks entirely superfluous?

GCNRevenger · 2005-03-04 18:39:43

I probobly should have included a dividing line between my comment about O'Keefe and my listing of reasons of why Shuttle risk-mitigation options were not practical...

...I think the reaction of the various persons on the board is evidence enough that O'Keefe was right that he had to make the HST SM4 option less favorable since the public would have been in a "save HST!" or "I'm so discusted with NASA!" mode without a better reason then SM4 being a bad deal per dollar. Right motive, but not thinking on his feet.

It is also possible that O'Keefe had an informal risk assesment performed and not the "offical" one that is claimed that wasn't available until after O'Keefe made his decision... At the time when NASA wasn't sure if Shuttle's heat shield would be safe enough even for ISS flights, an informal go/no-go with informed NASA managers would have been sufficent.

With a 2% historic outright failure of the TPS system, and signifigant damage 3-4% of the time, this would not have been a difficult decision particularly in light of the low benefits of the mission.

Anyway... none of this changes the calculus of the situation on iota, and HST SM4 is still a terrible deal even if Shuttle were 100% safe and we had unlimited ISS flights.

dicktice · 2005-03-05 06:37:02

Right on, GCNR. Thanks for clearing that up. I couldn't see you as an O'Keefe-hugger.

SpaceNut · 2005-03-07 08:39:33

While building and launching HOP is the logical thing to do. It should be done post haste as to allow for the continued study of the cosmic origins uninterupted.

[url=http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/health/bal-hs.hubble04mar04,1,7617223.story?coll=bal-health-headlines&ctrack=1&cset=true] Without hubble, picture is fuzzy
If repair missions end, the loss will be great, astronomers warn [/url]

The orbiting Chandra X-Ray Observatory and the Spitzer Space Telescope, powerful mountaintop observatories like the mighty Keck II in Hawaii and others less well-known - will continue to make important discoveries.
But until a telescope with Hubble's precision and access to the visible light spectrum comes along, "We will definitely have a major loss in capability - an international loss of capability," said Michael G. Hauser, deputy director of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore.

What Hubble does see:

The chief reasons, astronomers say, include Hubble's unique power and access to the "optical" bands of the spectrum - that range of light frequencies, or colors, visible to the human eye.
The light energy cascading toward the Earth arrives in a much broader range of wavelengths than we can see - from radio waves, to infrared (heat) and visible light, and on into the ultraviolet, X-ray and gamma-ray energy emitted by the hottest, most violent places in the universe.

cost of operating telescopes besides Hubble:

There are other space telescopes, but none with the Hubble's access to optical wavelengths or precision in the ultraviolet bands, or its name recognition. The two most powerful are the $1.3 billion Chandra X-ray Observatory, launched in 1999, and the $720 million Spitzer Space Telescope. An infrared observatory orbited in 2003, the Spitzer faces a fate similar to Hubble's after 2008, when the coolant vital to keeping its sensors chilled runs out.

Comming space telescopes:

The James Webb Space Telescope was to be launched in 2007, overlapping with the Hubble, but the date has slipped to 2011 or later. The Webb will see deeper into time and space than the Hubble can, but, like Spitzer, will see only infrared.
But cosmologists need to find lots more Ia supernovas. The Webb telescope and the planned Supernova Acceleration Probe (SNAP) could one day take up the pursuit. But the Webb won't launch before 2011, and SNAP is just a proposal.
Nasa is planning for a launch in late 2007 of the Kepler space telescope, which would be dedicated to finding similar planets orbiting sun-like stars. But Kepler won't have the Hubble's ability to probe the planets' atmospheres.

GCNRevenger · 2005-03-07 09:47:09

Well, i've said it once and I will say it again... the astronomers will not all spontainiously combust if they don't have a mega UV/Vis scope for a few years.

dicktice · 2005-03-07 12:43:39

GCNR. I wish you wouldn't keep on using that expression. The arguments by Space Nut are serious one worthy of consideration. In your reply, what you're really saying is: My mind's made up--don't bother me with the fact that astronomers grow old (and may even die) before getting time on the telescope. Your apparent lack of concern for working astronomers, who may need that one last HST observation, or survey, to confirm the truth of a lifetime of theoretical work in cosmology, say. The term anti-scientiific (which I deplore) comes to mind, and you know where I picked it up. At least give the kid a break, and answer his points. Your point by point objections are always interesting, but: "I've said it once and I will say it again..." from you is out of character.

GCNRevenger · 2005-03-07 13:10:51

Given the circumstances of the choices available, yes, that is what I am saying. That the few people who will be out of luck when Hubble stops operating are unimportant compared to the larger number of people who will never get to use any UV/Vis space telescope at all because we spent all the money for Hubble's sucessor on fixing today's Hubble to work a little bit longer.

This is a zero-sum game, either Hubble is fixed and might last a few years longer at the risk of 5-7 lives, OR we build Hubble Origins, which will last 3-4+ times longer then Hubble will post-SM4 and have the unique wide-field mode that no adaptive-optics telescope can match.

It is only because I have said as much in my numerous previous posts that I used the particular "said it once..." phrase.

John Creighton · 2005-03-07 13:19:50

If Hubble I is so important to the cause of science lets see some other organization cough up the money for it like the national science foundation or even a private organization. If it is for sentimental or historic reasons, lets see an organization dedicated to preserving old things cough up the money. Astronomers like every other science and engineering research group must work within a reasonable budget and make sensible economic choices. NASA is choosing what it thinks is best for Astronomy with the HOP, and it doesn’t have the money for both. NASA is not an organization dedicated strictly to astronomy and nore should it be. NASA is about advancing science and engineering though the use of aerospace technology. Astronomy is just one small subset of that endeavor.

GCNRevenger · 2005-03-07 14:11:53

Exactly...

Is four years or so worth of space telescope time worth $1,500,000,000 dollars? Is exposing five people and an irreplaceable manned spaceflight asset to a ~1-2% risk worth four years or so? The risk to NASA being gutted after a third Shuttle tragedy?

The certainty that astronomers will not have a UV/Vis space telescope after 2011-2012 or so?

And the certainty that there will be no wide-field optical imager for the forseeable future, only one of two or three things that new adaptive optics telescopes can't do for a fraction of the cost?

Clearly, the answer is "no," it is not worth it

SpaceNut · 2005-03-10 09:07:04

While the debate on any cost for or against Hubble may be a mute point if having already accepted the 2004-2005 years funding.

Astronomers, Senator Push for Hubble Repair Flight

Sen. Barbara Mikulski, a Maryland Democrat whose state is home to the Space Telescope Science Institute and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, told the space agency that a failure to keep working toward a mission to fix Hubble could be against the law.
In a letter to Frederick Gregory, NASA's acting administrator, Mikulski noted that Congress appropriated $291 million for fiscal 2005 for a Hubble servicing mission.
"I expect NASA to carry out Congress' intent and spend the entire amount appropriated this year so there will be no interruption in the planning, preparation and engineering work that will be necessary for a servicing mission to Hubble," she wrote.
The Bush administration's proposed 2006 budget requested only $93 million for the Hubble program, with $75 million of that set aside to bring the orbiting observatory safely to Earth.

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#76 2005-02-26 21:35:12

Re: Finally, a sensible solution to the Hubble debate - ... that we can all agree on...maybe.

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Re: Finally, a sensible solution to the Hubble debate - ... that we can all agree on...maybe.

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Re: Finally, a sensible solution to the Hubble debate - ... that we can all agree on...maybe.

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