hugix

I am aware that there are actions from other countries. I know the Netherlands delivered some anti missile defence systems in Turkey (I believe) to keep the damage inside the borders of Syria. And there are currently NATO delegates inspecting the situation and making sure neither party violates the basic human rights. But these actions won't stop the violence. And it seems like the situation won't be resolved quick on it's own.

Syria has been problematic for at least a year. Boston on the other hand is a safe place to live. I think that is what scared most people. Even safe places can be attacked by an einzelganger (and his older brother). This tragic attack on the innocent civilians is less sudden and has been a realistic fear for people. What saddens me the most is that the western world now refuses to take action. We did help in Libya and they seem to do better now. If the united nations claim they are there for world peace they should intervene and stop the violence! This tragic chemical attack could have been prevented if the western world had undertaken action a year ago!

I hope that SN isn't just chasing a dream...

Personally I don't think terraforming is science fact. We did something to our climate on Earth, that much is clear. but what and how and where will it end? We do not know. But even if terraforming was a fact, it would cost A LOT of money. And Mars-one nowhere on the website mentions definite plans of it. Currently Mars-one has a budget of $132,575 . If they want to send the first stuff to Mars in 2016 they'd better hurry up with the money. you cannot finance a Mars mission by selling T-shirts.

This is a great community because the people here like to help each other. When people post a achievement (like first Mun landing) people congratulate the poster and give him/her tips and tricks. Most other gaming communities are competitive in nature. When someone posts an achievement there every reaction is about how the commenter did it better.

It would be cool to expand scenario's perhaps a function to export your save file as a scenario so the community can make scenarios for each other (would really help in the challenges department). Like landing on the Mun in a craft that misses a landing leg. Or something like the Apollo 13 could be simulated by draining the lander stages of the fuel. But parts suddenly breaking in game would add nothing to the fun of the game. Even Orbiter, which is a realistic space simulator doesn't do defective parts. I see the editors as playing with Lego's. When one brick doesn't fit or misses one of these connector dots you throw it away and grab a new one. Whenever a Kerbal grabs a Mainsail and sees it's broken it throws it out and grabs a new one.

First launch is in 3 years, yet SpaceX seems to know nothing of a launch. Not a single launch has been ordered And with a budget of 132,575 dollars, that ain't happening.

Part failures like that (Or Apollo 13) won't be in KSP. All parts work like they are supposed to. It would be really screwed when you perform you're Laythe landing and 1 engine starts malfunctioning. It would dagame the fun in the game.

Which spacecraft are they going to buy from spaceX. As far as I know spaceX has currently one in development designed for Lower Earth Orbit targets like the ISS.

I think that the only one who is going to fly is Bas Lansdorp himself. Far away from the rainy Netherlands to a sunny beach and with him his toothbrush and a suitcase filled with the donated money.

I think most of you on this forum heard of Mars-one, a project developed by the Dutch Bas Lansdorp who is being sponsored by nobel prize winner Gerard 't Hooft and a few other brainiacs. their goal is to send humans to Mars without returning starting with the first human settlement in 2023. Mars-one thinks that they can fund their missions by donations from people and by selling Merchandise. And when the crew has arrived they sell the rights to a production company to prduce a big brother kinda show. When I first heard of the idea I was exited, it had a solid idea and not only was there tech talk but also financial talk (something most space exploration lovers forget). But now, one and a half year later I got my doubts. First of all. The astronaut selection program consists of signing up on a website and making a video about why you should go to Mars... We've sure come a long way since the Mercury 7.... This seems rather odd. second. Mars one still has no solid plans on the technology, there are currently no suitable spacecraft in development for such a mission. There are no blueprints on how such a spacecraft should work. Not only would it be needed to serve the crew during the trip... But after landing it has to function as a base for at least till the next launch window+9 months. third. There is no launcher. Since nothing is known about the craft there is no knowing how much the launcher should be capable of lifting. Mars-one says on the website that they will use the Falcon nine Heavy. that launcher is capable (when it is finished) of transporting 13 tons to Mars. The Apollo spacecraft was about 30 tons. and that could only serve a crew of 3 for about a week! And forth. The finances. According to MArs-one, a single launch will cost about 6 and a half billion dollars. At the moment they got : $ 132,575 . That si about 1/5000th of what they need for simply the first mission (an unmanned mission that will bring the first supplies). I do not see how they can get 20 billion dollars (The plan is to send 2 unmanned missions for supplies and a rover) before 2022.

Well these are two "official" names. the bay on which KSC is located is called "Booster Bay" And the continent on which KSC is is called Kerfrica.

The thing that annoys me the most is how people do not understand what internet is. Since it has become accessible to the non geek public it has become more social. People treat it as a right to access it. A few months ago our city was upgraded to fiberglass internet. We got a few letters, was posted in the local newspapers and was mentioned on the local television that internet may be slow or inaccessible because of testing and migrating the internet. A lot of people (including my little brother) where furious about this. Someone denied them the access to the internet! How dare they... Yet these people have absolutely no idea how the internet works(or what it is). That feels kind of weird to me. We need to get a drivers licence to show we know how traffic and the rules that come with it works. But on the internet, where we do our communications, our agenda's and our financial management(!!) We do not give a damn abut how it works and what it is doing. A lot of people use the internet daily. On the job or at home. But I am sure that at least 80% of all the internet users never stand still and ask them self how internet work. For these people they got the mouse, the screen, the keyboard and 'the box that does magic'. A few weeks ago there was a story about a 14-16 year old girl who was bullied into suicide on the internet. This of course is very tragic. But what struck me is that she had absolutely no real connection to the bullies. Before the internet you had a connection to your bullies. They either lived in your neighbourhood or where in your school class. You had no choice but to deal with it. Yet on the internet it is just a simple action. Close the web browser and do something else. It is almost as if she felt it was her human right to visit that page with the bullies. The internet is taking over our lives more and more and we all do not care about it. Either because it is ignorance or because it is convenience. Another story : A few months ago I kinda rolled into a relationship. During work I introduced my girlfriend to a colleague of mine. My colleague tilted he head a bit to the right, looked at me and my girl and said "But facebook says you don't have a girlfriend". I was dumbfounded. She believed the internet more than what I personally told her. We need to treat the internet as a tool again. A great network to share and collaborate on scientific and technical subjects. For that purpose it was designed. when timBL designed the HTTP protocol that was his idea. To share information from different systems on one network. Not to post pictures of your food.

The problem with win8 (and the IT sector in general) is that developers don't think about the long run. The entire sector has become a gimmick of itself. Microsoft has a very hard time keeping track of what they want to build. Vista was a result of this (It had to have everything before the deadline came in). I have seen my teachers and fellow students use win8 and it seems really devious. I have yet to use it myself for longer than 10 minutes but it feels forced. I'm used to my keyboard and sometimes my mouse to control the computer, and I liked that very much. There are very few operating systems that make me smile. OSX treats me like a little child. Windows has no vision for the long run. The user OS feels forced and weird. They did the same in Office with that ribbon system and I still hate that. And Linux, I love technicians but the community has become very hostile the last few years. I cancelled my Linux magazine subscription because it was only comparisons between how software works on different systems without telling me what the software does.

It hit me when I read that Kennedy Space centre is placed on a 28 something degree tilt. Asked myself why and found the answer. To bad Minmus is the only logical moon where you can use this little trick. It would be cool if Duna got some sort of Phobos & Deimos kind of moons on a fun inclination.

Whilst I was building a Minmus base I noticed that twice a kerbal day the KSC is directly underneath the path of Minmus. So I could save time and fuel by simply waiting till the launch pad is directly underneath the path and launch in the same inclination as Minmus. If Minmus is going south just launch in a 96 degree heading. If going up launch in a 82 degree heading. If done right you don't need to do a mid-course correction to set the inclination right. Saves time when you got a lot of crafts going that way.

Obviously, but still. The idea that a atomic bomb test could blast a lid into a heliocentric orbit is a very cool idea!

Off course it is not impossible. During Gemini NASA showed it could manage two manned flights at the same time, but that is just pure down to the technicians and engineers. NASA had a way bigger budget back then. To prepare a craft that might not even launch and has no scientific (or commercial) work to do is to expensive. We can land on the Moon, we can cure people of cancer, we can make deaf people hear again! Off course it is not impossible to make a craft capable of saving a stranded crew. and there are certain contingency protocols for space travel. The ISS astronauts got their Soyuz crafts. The Salyuts (at least Salyut 6) had a empty Soyuz attached to save a stranded crew from doom. And NASA even had the STS 300 and 400 missions to save a stranded crew. But these missions where only put in place in very special missions. (like STS 125 the last Hubble repair mission) The reason the Shuttle missions had no backup vessels was because of money. It is an investment that will never generate profit.

but even then it is a market build around Lower Earth orbit. There are no profitable business plans thinkable that involve Mars or anything other.

Do you drive in docking mode (I believe that's the name). It disables the roll controls which helps you not to flip over the rover. I'm having little problems with my rovers. And the problems I'm having I can solve myself by editing the designs.

you guys make me sick! I still love this story! I read it as a child, loved it and moved on. A few years ago I became infested with the space exploration decease and now it is on my night stand together with 1984 (another holy book of mine). It is not so much the story that I love but it is the things that came true. things Verne never could have guessed to be so. NASA got formed from he US army (hence the first 7 astronauts where army personnel). He got the launching site quite right (Florida). The struggles to launch it. The only thing he got really wrong was the way to get there. He envisioned a cannon. But still Most of the calculations where within accurate reach. an dhe wrote this a 100 years before Apollo! another book I love is the right stuff I saw it mentioned it here once before. It tells the story of the Mercury program and all the stuff that came with it. From the humiliating medical tests to the wives who where worried sick and being plagued by the press. And also because tom Wolfe is my favourite journalist. It was because of above mentioned book I came in contact with his work but he has a lot of other books that are worth the read. If you want to broaden your horizon just buy a random book of this guy!

And all your examples take months to build and prepare. The quickest turn around for a Space shuttle is something like 55 days! That still is a lot for a vehicle designed to have a quick turn around time. Having a spare vehicle ready to launch is impossible for now and only works when you're in LEO. There is no possible way that NASA could have saved the astronauts from Apollo 13 with a secondary vehicle. You try to rendezvous with a vehicle on it's way to the Mun in KSP. From a spectator point of view we often forget that manned space missions are still a very difficult job. Even if a Apollo Saturn V launch had a 99% success rate it would still mean more than a thousand parts had failed. I love the live streams, Big blast, huge flames and lots of fire. And 10 minutes later the craft is in freaking space! And then we go recreate the launch in KSP, we open up the editor, slap some parts together like it is LEGO and we do the same. but the real world ain't LEGO, engines can fail for no apparent reason and solar arrays can refuse to deploy. If you want to launch people into space about a million things have to go right. If you want to launch a rescue craft 2 million (minus a few defective parts) need to go right!

Unless you get such a big kick with enough momentum to make it through the atmosphere and still got enough energy left to reach escape velocity.

Exactly my point. KSP is a fun game that teaches you the very first steps into orbital mechanics in a very fun to play way. If KSP was more like the real life thingies in the picture it would make the learning curve even more difficult. It takes the best out of both worlds (simulator and game)

I was really disappointed by this movie, the story was very rushed and weird. There was no reason to cut the EVA catastrophe scene out of continuity. Before this scene the movie paraded to many times with a closed bunk on the background it completely killed the suspense. "Oh no I got goo on my suite". Yep, he's gonna die... Also the characters where really 2 dimensional, the movie had a slow pace, there is nothing wrong with a slow pace but at least use it t build character. (the Russel T Davies Era of Doctor who had a slow pace in a lot of episodes but it was used to build some great characters... who doesn't love Wilfred). In the trailers there where lots of shots of a beautifull Jupiter and a scary looking Europa. Even the (I believe it was) footage from the New horizons mission was used. But these shots where very rare and way t short. I loved the shot of Jupiter and it's moons. It could have cranked up the artistic part of the movie with more of these colourful shots. As for the science, During the trip towards Europa I loved it. The educational videos. The artificial gravity. I loved the shot where the guy went from gravity to zero G. Untill the landing... I felt the landing was a bit rushed and to sci fi. The whole happening wasn't believable. Maybe Cordero should have used some inspiration from the Apollo 11 landing. Everyone on this forum has seen it (at least I hope so), and the suspense in the Apollo landing was better than the rushed landing in Europa. Less characters, more science. It would have boosted the hard science level and the suspense of the movie. After the landing the movie had a very rushed feeling. This is inherent to movies, where you got only so little time to tell a tale. But this movie had a very slow pace in the journey towards Europa. Remember the astronaut that died had a kid. I feel the movie would not have suffered if the guy only had a girlfriend and no kid. It would open up some room in the movie for other stuff and it would loose nothing of the characters. So far so good. I made some complaints but still enjoyed watching it. Until the submarine probe came in the mix. Why send a crew toward Europa to release a probe? It's the Space Shuttle all over again (why send both crew and a satellite in orbit ?)this started to kill the true science in the movie. To come back to a point I made before. After the landing it was completely done with the cool spacey wacey shots. The shots of Europa through the window felt childish and rushed. I would have loved some cool exterior shots of europa. Also the EVA on Europa was weird to say the least. Way fabricate a suite, make an airlock in the lander and not having definite plans to have the crew go on EVA. And then the part that annoyed the hell out of me (you know where I'm going). Florescent squids on Europa. For a movie, it is good enough. It is 90 minutes of entertainment. It does contain true science, but also kills this when the opportunity arrives. The trailer promised great shots. I felt betrayed by the trailer. Exiting parts in the mission(Liftoff, landing, EVA on Europa) where rushed and the time it freed was not used to it's full extend. I agree with the first 4 words of the title of this topic.