The Future Of Humanity

[ISE]

I learned something from our history as people. We seem to advance the most in our knowledge of new technology, the we feel it is at our advantage. The space race, Soviet Russia, & The United States, one of the greatest times of knowledge and advancement of technology. The Russians were so determined, as were the Americans. They both each changed the world. Going to space has brought us great things, such as artificial limbs, and MRIs. It happened to fast and so quickly! But now here we are, in 2016, you would think that we would have gotten much further than where we are now. Sure we "had" the space shuttle program, and we have rovers on mars. But the money that was funding all this exploration and learning is very slim right now. The United States Government currently funds NASA with barely 1% of their government currency. They "retired" they shuttles, we no longer have money to go to the moon, or send our own astronauts to the ISS by our rockets here in the US. We have our allies in Russia to thank for helping us maintain our joint operation on the ISS. Sure we have the no SLS Orion... but if you ask me, all this is just laziness to me. I hope more private companies like SPACEX help us with this, as well as Russia. Because the united states government has given up on science. If we continue our research of microgravity in space, we have a whole new playing field to understand the things and nature that we work with, and live in. I just don't know how, or where we are headed currently. Another issue is the cost for rocket fuel. Getting to space is no easy task at all! We should be using the funds we have left here in the US to find a new way to get us into space. Im talking about thinking out of the box in a massive scale. Im sure many people have talked about this and ways of doing it. But frankely money is the main issue. And I just don't want to see the only advancement in technology to be in phones and cars. I hope to put an end to this, I want to learn and find a way to get us back into space like we used to, but better. My goal in life is to change the way we think about space and we get there. Im open to any comments and suggestions, to what you guys know/think about this contraversal subject. Thank You.  

[Green Baron]

A noble goal :-) Make it so !

I think that data, technology and in a way moral is missing to judge whether it's feasible/possible to make the visions real.

What comes to my mind is that your overlook spanned only the last 2-3 generations, for us westerners relatively peaceful. Let's hope it stays like this and development goes on without major setbacks. I personally mourn the fact that other rich countries like germany e.g. spend even less, not only on spaceflight but on education and science in general ...

Edit: i would give my vote to the ones that promise to divert the most money into basic fundamental research and education ;-)

Edited November 1, 2016 by Green Baron

[DDE]

Well, @Green Baron, I hate to tell you that, but I'm afraid that a Silver Age of space exploration won't begin without a world war or several. The original Golden Age was fuelled by the immediate post-war generation, and it retired along with them.

[cubinator]

According to Elon Musk, the cost of the raw materials required to build a rocket is about 2% of the cost of a rocket right now. So it's not that we can't make rockets like we make cars, it's that we just haven't taken action to create a system to do that. That plus the growing possibility of reusability will likely start making space travel a lot cheaper than it was before, which will stir up more economic opportunities, leading to an upwards spiral possibly including cylindrical ping pong tables to be played in microgravity.

[SR]

rockets will probably never be made like cars for a few simple reasons:

1. safety rockets have to be made to a tiny margin of error.

2. millions of cars are made every year, too few rockets are needed, even without re usability, too make a mass production system possible.

 

[YNM]

My respect to OP. Though I have to admit most people lurking around this corner of the forum is going to look like a pessimist to the "future" goals. Not really pessimistic - just realistic. Probably some have look around to progress for years and didn't found any improvements, which put development in a halt.

On 11/2/2016 at 6:24 AM, cubinator said:

According to Elon Musk, the cost of the raw materials required to build a rocket is about 2% of the cost of a rocket right now. So it's not that we can't make rockets like we make cars, it's that we just haven't taken action to create a system to do that.

There's a reason why raw ore is priceless compared to the end product. (hint : not all ore ends up as product.)

Also, rockets are in a bit of dilemma where they have to be very-well-engineered while for most they're a disposable thing. Unlike planes or ships or rafts or carriages or horses or your feet.

[kunok]

What NASA is precisely doing is science, research and development of new techs and solar system bodies. Is the private corporations like spaceX that aren't doing science. They use the NASA research to make goals, it's the current trend in politics public research funding and private use of that development.

What obsession with the vector... Is only a transport device, no the end itself.

On 2/11/2016 at 0:24 AM, cubinator said:

According to Elon Musk, the cost of the raw materials required to build a rocket is about 2% of the cost of a rocket right now. So it's not that we can't make rockets like we make cars, it's that we just haven't taken action to create a system to do that. That plus the growing possibility of reusability will likely start making space travel a lot cheaper than it was before, which will stir up more economic opportunities, leading to an upwards spiral possibly including cylindrical ping pong tables to be played in microgravity.

Lot's of mass produced goods have a raw materials cost of only 2% or less, so what? I designed something than the prototype cost were more than 1000 times the raw material, in fact, they didn't even put the raw material cost in the bill, and I don't think the mass production would get to that 2%. That kind of oversimplification of costs that musk makes is very naive.

The cost of to transport any space good usually is tiny compared with the cost of the space good itself. Space is a very damaging environment, you can't send cheap stuff out to GEO and expect to work fine.

 

@ISEWhat I think is really weird is that you think that space industry didn't advanced in the last years but the automobiles industry has advanced a lot. Automobiles are almost the same that the ones 60s, only making changes for diminish a little the fuel use, and the esthetics/aerodinamics. There is little mechanical advancement, and most of it come from the better manufacturing techniques (easy example: the change to more aerodynamic profile, this rounded profiles were because the improvement in 5 axis cnc mills, so we can easily manufacture round dies), not really from research or development. Electrical cars come from the development of batteries, which wasn't done by the car industry.

But if you see the technical improvements and changes in the space industry they are pretty huge, just don't focus only in the launcher, is only a transport device for a good, look the good itself. Maybe the problem is the lack of interesting goods for the average joe in space? The lack of human space travel?

We have better than ever meteorological, and earth observations services, the commercial communications satellites nowadays are only usually limited by the amount of fuel for correcting the orbital perturbations, we have better than ever Space research, for example, the james webb telescope is already finished and would go to space in less than two years (IIRC), we have impresive rovers in mars, there are even more being manufactured, we have lots of orbiters in the solar system and more are planed.

May I suggest respectfully than you have a biased view? NASA and other space agencies needs better marketing departments, that's for sure.

Edited November 27, 2016 by kunok
better order

[tater]

On 11/1/2016 at 5:35 AM, ISE said:

The United States Government currently funds NASA with barely 1% of their government currency. They "retired" they shuttles, we no longer have money to go to the moon, or send our own astronauts to the ISS by our rockets here in the US. We have our allies in Russia to thank for helping us maintain our joint operation on the ISS. Sure we have the no SLS Orion... but if you ask me, all this is just laziness to me. I hope more private companies like SPACEX help us with this, as well as Russia. Because the united states government has given up on science

What % of GDP does YOUR country spend on space exploration? BTW, NASA gets closer to 0.5% of US Federal spending (people always think that the military gets half, for example, but that's the discretionary budget, and 2/3 if US Federal spending is actually on social welfare programs that are not discretionary).

The total dollars matter. NASA gets a number in the teens (of billions of $). If your own country spends less than that on space exploration, your goal should be at home, not complaining about how my tax dollars are spent. Is your own country's lack of spending laziness, or just MY country's? 

The US spends vastly more on science than anyone else. How many probes has your country sent to Jupiter or Pluto, exactly? If you include the military R&D programs (most are in fact "science"), the US government spends ~135B$ a year on science. I assume then that every other country "gave up" on science forever ago, right?

Edited November 27, 2016 by tater

[ISE]

20 hours ago, SR said:

rockets will probably never be made like cars for a few simple reasons:

1. safety rockets have to be made to a tiny margin of error.

2. millions of cars are made every year, too few rockets are needed, even without re usability, too make a mass production system possible.

 

Well then I guess we are going to have to prove you wrong.  

16 hours ago, kunok said:

What NASA is precisely doing is science, research and development of new techs and solar system bodies. Is the private corporations like spaceX that aren't doing science. They use the NASA research to make goals, it's the current trend in politics public research funding and private use of that development.

What obsession with the vector... Is only a transport device, no the end itself.

Lot's of mass produced goods have a raw materials cost of only 2% or less, so what? I designed something than the prototype cost were more than 1000 times the raw material, in fact, they didn't even put the raw material cost in the bill, and I don't think the mass production would get to that 2%. That kind of oversimplification of costs that musk makes is very naive.

The cost of to transport any space good usually is tiny compared with the cost of the space good itself. Space is a very damaging environment, you can't send cheap stuff out to GEO and expect to work fine.

 

@ISEWhat I think is really weird is that you think that space industry didn't advanced in the last years but the automobiles industry has advanced a lot. Automobiles are almost the same that the ones 60s, only making changes for diminish a little the fuel use, and the esthetics/aerodinamics. There is little mechanical advancement, and most of it come from the better manufacturing techniques (easy example: the change to more aerodynamic profile, this rounded profiles were because the improvement in 5 axis cnc mills, so we can easily manufacture round dies), not really from research or development. Electrical cars come from the development of batteries, which wasn't done by the car industry.

But if you see the technical improvements and changes in the space industry they are pretty huge, just don't focus only in the launcher, is only a transport device for a good, look the good itself. Maybe the problem is the lack of interesting goods for the average joe in space? The lack of human space travel?

We have better than ever meteorological, and earth observations services, the commercial communications satellites nowadays are only usually limited by the amount of fuel for correcting the orbital perturbations, we have better than ever Space research, for example, the james webb telescope is already finished and would go to space in less than two years (IIRC), we have impresive rovers in mars, there are even more being manufactured, we have lots of orbiters in the solar system and more are planed.

May I suggest respectfully than you have a biased view? NASA and other space agencies needs better marketing departments, that's for sure.

I understand that reasoning, but if we are to advance faster, and further than we already have, we need to find better ways to get things into space. Or to simply make them in space. 

12 hours ago, tater said:

What % of GDP does YOUR country spend on space exploration? BTW, NASA gets closer to 0.5% of US Federal spending (people always think that the military gets half, for example, but that's the discretionary budget, and 2/3 if US Federal spending is actually on social welfare programs that are not discretionary).

The total dollars matter. NASA gets a number in the teens (of billions of $). If your own country spends less than that on space exploration, your goal should be at home, not complaining about how my tax dollars are spent. Is your own country's lack of spending laziness, or just MY country's? 

The US spends vastly more on science than anyone else. How many probes has your country sent to Jupiter or Pluto, exactly? If you include the military R&D programs (most are in fact "science"), the US government spends ~135B$ a year on science. I assume then that every other country "gave up" on science forever ago, right?

Little probes and telescopes, are not going to keep is "afloat" in the space industry. People will forget why we go to space. We need to see people back to the moon, we need to at least spend more than 0.5%. Im extremely against how my country spends its taxes. And I'm well aware of how they do it. This is not a political debate. Its simply a wake up call. 

[tater]

6 hours ago, ISE said:

Little probes and telescopes, are not going to keep is "afloat" in the space industry. People will forget why we go to space. We need to see people back to the moon, we need to at least spend more than 0.5%. Im extremely against how my country spends its taxes. And I'm well aware of how they do it. This is not a political debate. Its simply a wake up call. 

Sorry we're too lazy to spend money your own country won't, and that we have "given up" on science because we spend more than anyone else on it (not sure how that math works, but it's your claim, not mine).

What a non-citizen thinks about US government spending is so far past irrelevant it's hard to even describe. You want a wake up call? Spending other peoples money is what politics is by definition. 

The Space Race that you mentioned---was 100% political. It was the 2 superpowers showing off to attract the Third World (unaligned = third). Nothing more. 

You mention science and exploration---the manned space program is a PR stunt, it has nothing at all to do with science. A purely scientific space program would be all "little probes and telescopes," because probes are always more cost effective, and for the same input of money will always produce more knowledge---something that will only increase as intelligent systems become better and better.

[ISE]

@tater Please don't take my words from the original post so hard. You miss understand me, I only want the US to be more involved with space, science, and us being in space. I am aware that the space race, was a fear fueled endeavor, and yes, you could say it was a political war, wit communism and capitalism being the two parties. Please keep this discussion universally related to space, exploration, and ways of better our knowledge of the subject. I meant no disrespect to any races, cultures, countries, etc. I am simply  expressing my love for space, exploration, advancement in technology, and especially bettering ourselves as "Humans". Probes, and telescopes are very important, but I think there should be more of a joint effort to get humans back into space and expand on our knowledge of the universe we live in. I feel like the ultimate goal for humans is to live for ever, or to advance the way we live. We cannot simply keep our microscopes and hands on earth, we gotta look beyond and discover new things, beings, places, life, and technology. In a sense very much like starters or any other space exploration movie or story. 

To me, the only way we can reach the ultimate goal of knowledge, is to cooperate, and advance. 

Edited November 28, 2016 by ISE

[tater]

We all want the same thing here, I imagine, given our mutual interest in space exploration.

The thing we all agree on is likely fairly broad, however. "Exploring space," I suppose. Manned space is another issue, entirely, and I happen to be a big fan of it---though I don't pretend it's anything but a "stunt." I think human spaceflight is desirable entirely as a psychological exercise to demonstrate a "frontier" for people to personally explore. It's why I go up a new canyon hiking... to see what it looks like.

When it comes to devoting resources, however, you have to accept reality. As someone who grew up with multiple manned space programs, I've finally absorbed the reality of the way things are done. NASA will not get grossly more money short of an existential crisis (the need to imminently divert a planet-killer or something). Asking for more is pointless, and particularly in any fashion aside from the only one actually available---somehow electing people who agree with you in enough numbers. That's not happening, particularly if you cannot even vote.

[ISE]

7 minutes ago, tater said:

We all want the same thing here, I imagine, given our mutual interest in space exploration.

The thing we all agree on is likely fairly broad, however. "Exploring space," I suppose. Manned space is another issue, entirely, and I happen to be a big fan of it---though I don't pretend it's anything but a "stunt." I think human spaceflight is desirable entirely as a psychological exercise to demonstrate a "frontier" for people to personally explore. It's why I go up a new canyon hiking... to see what it looks like.

When it comes to devoting resources, however, you have to accept reality. As someone who grew up with multiple manned space programs, I've finally absorbed the reality of the way things are done. NASA will not get grossly more money short of an existential crisis (the need to imminently divert a planet-killer or something). Asking for more is pointless, and particularly in any fashion aside from the only one actually available---somehow electing people who agree with you in enough numbers. That's not happening, particularly if you cannot even vote.

Current debate aside, are you suggesting that I can't vote?  Cuz I did vote in the recent US presidential election. Im 18, and it was a, surprising experience to vote for the first time. I got there and someone got word of my age and they made a very big scene congratulating me for being an american and voting for the first time. LOL (it was very awkward) 

Edited November 28, 2016 by ISE

[tater]

22 minutes ago, ISE said:

Current debate aside, are you suggesting that I can't vote?  Cuz I did vote in the recent US presidential election. Im 18, and it was a, surprising experience to vote for the first time. I got there and someone got word of my age and they made a very big scene congratulating me for being an american and voting for the first time. LOL (it was very awkward) 

I thought you were not from the US, sorry.

You said, 

Quote

with barely 1% of their government currency.

"Their" implied you were not American (else "our").

NASA funding has remained fairly constant as a function of GDP, I don't see that changing. There is a finite amount of other people's money to spend, and the bulk of the population tends to want that money spent directly on them. If I were in charge, I'd dump most "programmatic" spending entirely, and happily throw a lot of that money at space. That will never happen, though, and no one would vote for me---you can imagine the attack ads: "My opponent wants to take your SS, and Medicaid and buy rockets!" and my answer would have to be, "Exactly!"

[78stonewobble]

A point tho... money isn't really the problem. The priority of the majority is... If something is important or just deemed as such, people and governments will find the money for it.

4 hours ago, tater said:

NASA funding has remained fairly constant as a function of GDP, I don't see that changing. There is a finite amount of other people's money to spend, and the bulk of the population tends to want that money spent directly on them. If I were in charge, I'd dump most "programmatic" spending entirely, and happily throw a lot of that money at space. That will never happen, though, and no one would vote for me---you can imagine the attack ads: "My opponent wants to take your SS, and Medicaid and buy rockets!" and my answer would have to be, "Exactly!"

The problem isn't spending other people's money, but spending other people's money on the wrong thing?

Maybe instead of going to the extremes of either side... There is a middleground... Eg. doubling or tripling that 1 percent for space exploration, while keeping the other things going... to the net result of... everyone paying a little more and/or receiving a little less.

...

More generally on the topic... Well, in the very long run, humanity (or our descendants) either go to space permanently or that is where the future ends for us... In the short run... There is, as far as we know, no asteroid hurtling towards us... Tho I do believe that is something we should be rather be prepared for, but apart from that, we can all agree on that we do have alot of problems at home.

Edited November 28, 2016 by 78stonewobble

[tater]

Money is never spent on the wrong thing by definition. If it was "wrong" it would not have been passed. 

This can easily get off the rails, but meaningful taxes are in fact only paid by a small percentage of the population at the top.  Asking those people to pay more is not terribly fair (anyone who agrees can always elect to pay more than their share of taxes, the IRS is happy for the check). The mass of people who in fact don't pay the bills don't see any benefit from space probes---they'd rather have free stuff, or direct transfers to themselves.

[78stonewobble]

3 hours ago, tater said:

1. Money is never spent on the wrong thing by definition. If it was "wrong" it would not have been passed. 

2. This can easily get off the rails, but meaningful taxes are in fact only paid by a small percentage of the population at the top. 3. Asking those people to pay more is not terribly fair (4. anyone who agrees can always elect to pay more than their share of taxes, the IRS is happy for the check). 5. The mass of people who in fact don't pay the bills don't see any benefit from space probes---they'd rather have free stuff, or direct transfers to themselves.

1. That is certainly true... from that perspective.

2. That depends on the range of the population.

3. Sure it is, they are also consuming ressources at a prodigious rate, to generate that kind of wealth either through production or having a gazillion employees, selling to a gazillion customers and inflict more bodily harm than most, through eg. work injuries, work related illnesses and so forth.

4. One could make the same argument for your idea to put all in NASA.

5. The US currently have an unemployment rate of around 5 percent... Sure not all of the employing 95 percent are paying much themselves in money, but they sure are paying other people's bills... through their work. There are very few, if any, in the forbes 500, whose riches entirely stems from and only from, what they themselves can do in a day.

[ISE]

 

Please delete this (my) single comment 

Edited November 29, 2016 by ISE

[Emperor of the Titan Squid]

We need to keep pushing onwards. Do what we can to make humanity better and more powerful. Space Exploration is a big part of that.

[Guest]

I like to think of the future of space exploration like the "discovery" of the Americas by Europe: when they first discovered it, European leaders didn't care much about it since it was much easier to go to closer places to trade. But then they found out they could explore the area by scamming, slavery and mining, and then they started to properly explore it.

 

I presume it's going to be the same with space. Right now, it's much easier to just stay at home. If we find out a way to get resources from space (read: profit), I think much more effort would be given in exploring it.

History repeats itself, eh?

[tater]

Cost effectively collecting resources to deliver anyplace with money (read: Earth) is non-trivial. It likely will involve hauling in NEOs, however, and other jobs better served by robots.

[HebaruSan]

This looks like as good a place as any to dump my latest attempt to digest all the threads about human spaceflight and colonization...

Life for humans is far safer and more pleasant on Earth than anywhere else. We already live in the best place we're ever going to find in terms of gravity, atmospheric composition, atmospheric pressure, temperature, radiation, and on and on. The only thing that's kind of difficult here is getting to orbit. For a colony to grow to self-sufficiency, it's going to have to match Earth in enough of those essentials and offer enough advantages that a lot of people are motivated to choose to go there and stay there.

That's part of the reason why I've started to conclude that to really live in space, we'll need O'Neill cylinders with complete functioning biospheres powered by solar or nuclear. If we can make it to that point, then suddenly there's both a workforce and a market for mining asteroids and manufacturing in space. The residents of the cylinders will want materials to make replacement parts, consumer goods, habitat expansions, etc., and they'll be well positioned to acquire them, so they'll have a natural incentive to expand humanity's space footprint exponentially.

But until then, until there's a vital human force sustaining and driving the development out of pure self-interest, any other human spaceflight is trying to force it prematurely, in a way. Yes, NASA could be super-funded to embark on the century-long project of building a sustainable Mars colony, but what if the funding gets cut a few presidential administrations down the line? Not only would the project itself be halted, but now someone has to decide whether to mount a rescue mission, and we've got nothing to show for it. If we were already at the point where space activity as such was profitable, it wouldn't be as big of a deal, because other sponsors would want the colony for more reliable reasons. But when NASA/ESA is the only game in town, it may be for the best that they focus on laying the groundwork by sending robots to look at Ceres and discover that Mars is covered in perchlorates.

[KerikBalm]

Realistically, while I do find space travel fascinating... humanities future looks sketchy, and we need to solve other things before solving problems of low cost access to orbit.

* sustainable CO2 neutral energy production

* halting population growth

* protecting the remaining ecosystems

* implementing economic systems that disrupt the current system with a feeback loop that exhibits bistability: a fancy way to describe a system where the rich get richer, the poor get poorer, right up to the breaking point and the poor can get no poorer (ie they can't survive at any lower wages)

* Solving basic fundamental social issues that promote anti-intellectualism and turning away from science in general.

Its pretty hard to think about colonizing mars given the political power of a group of people who think the world is less than 10k years old, or that global warming is a hoax.

 

 

[Ten Key]

18 minutes ago, KerikBalm said:

* Solving basic fundamental social issues that promote anti-intellectualism and turning away from science in general.

I would argue that manned spaceflight is one way of countering that. There is a psychological aspect to exploration that should not be ignored. 

[ISE]

On November 30, 2016 at 4:10 PM, Emperor of the Titan Squid said:

We need to keep pushing onwards. Do what we can to make humanity better and more powerful. Space Exploration is a big part of that.

I absolutely agree!