I almost forgot that today's the 46th anniversary of the launching of Sputnik I, back in 1957. We may have taken four steps forward and two steps back, but we'll never be the way we were before then...
And today is also the -360th anniversary of the launching of the USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D, too! Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
I really wish there were more to celebrate this anniversary with than a decrepit space station and a bunch of probes.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
Actually, we may -- not on today exactly, but I believe we're going to be welcoming the third nation to the manned spaceflight-capable family within a week or so. Regardless of the political reasons, I'm glad China feels that space is important enough to spend their own resources on, as well.
More specifically, the reports are saying that China will be launching their manned Shenzhou V capsule during the week of their National Day celebrations (which, IIRC, is this coming week).
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
Yeah, but capsules alone won't spark a new space race. Now if China started building low-orbit infrastructure of its own, that would grab people's attention.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
That is scheduled for the week after....
Now, if ideology didn't hinder things so we could have a really amazing space exploration capability....
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
quote:Originally posted by Cartman: Yeah, but capsules alone won't spark a new space race. Now if China started building low-orbit infrastructure of its own, that would grab people's attention.
Well, what do you think China's going to do? Launch a manned capsule, land a Human on the moon, and then sit on their hands for the next 30 years afterwards?
Oh wait...
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
It wouldn't be unprecedented, no. B)
Posted by Peregrinus (Member # 504) on :
Decrepit, Cartman? How do you figure? Mir is gone. The one up there now is still being built. It's too small, over budget, and poorly advocated, but it's certainly not decrepit.
--Jonah
Posted by Balaam Xumucane (Member # 419) on :
Yes, but it's also not shaped like a wagon wheel, and where's the love in that?
Posted by Saltah'na (Member # 33) on :
And it doesn't have defense batteries like Phasers and Photon Torpedoes....
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
Well it does have a photon launcher, they attack incoming craft with it all the time, when they are in last-stage docking maneuvers. Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Jettison trash bag One on my command....
Posted by Bond, James Bond (Member # 1127) on :
quote:Originally posted by Nim: Well it does have a photon launcher, they attack incoming craft with it all the time, when they are in last-stage docking maneuvers.
Bah, that's just an illusion created by Thoron Fields and Duranium shadows.
I welcome Chinese manned spaceflight. Maybe it will give us Americans a kick in the ass to fund our own space program better if we think the Chinese will upstage us. Nothing like a little competition to get us out of our funk.
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
quote:Originally posted by Peregrinus: Decrepit, Cartman? How do you figure? Mir is gone. The one up there now is still being built. It's too small, over budget, and poorly advocated, but it's certainly not decrepit.
The word was... ill-chosen. But from the looks of things, the ISS will probably come plunging down before it's ever completed. Mir (which was plagued by difficulties) at least lived a long and fruitful life. Heck, even Skylab held out for six productive years despite the setbacks it faced. This station just... orbits. There's not much the ISS can be used for in its present state. If you ask me, that is a colossal waste of effort.
Posted by First of Two (Member # 16) on :
I want to melt a bar of gold on the ISS and let it form itself into a perfect sphere, when in liquid state. No flaws, marks or seams. Mmm...
I saw an astronaut do it with raspberry lemonade once, I've been smitten since.
Conversely, they want to start ball-bearings factories in orbit. The perfect spherical shapes, so far unattainable on Earth, are the graal of engineers of that trade. Minimum wear and tear.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
ball bearings and Charlie Browns head....
Although a bar of gold would be more pleasent to trade in....
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
To stir the pot:
quote: As a test of national will and skill, Chinese spaceflight is vastly preferable to, say, invading Taiwan. I promise to watch Chinese manned spaceflight with great interest, and I might even buy the mission patch and decals, but frankly, there isn�t much there there. There haven�t been men or women out of low-earth orbit in some 30 solid years. We don�t seem to miss them in any way that is quantifiable.
There is little point in stepping onto the moon, leaving flags and footprints, and then retreating once again. The staggering price of shipping a kilogram into orbit has not come down in decades. In the meantime, unmanned spacecraft grow smaller and more capable every year. Until we bioengineer ourselves to enjoy cosmic rays, or until we�ve got rockets that can lift a Winnebago made of solid lead, this technology belongs on the museum shelf.
Now go read Schismatrix.
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
That was a very good article, but I'm pretty disappointed he chose to add cosmetic implants or DVDs to the list and not tobacco. He can't be too smart if he neglected tobacco, Sol.
What is "Schismatrix"?
Posted by Sol System (Member # 30) on :
Tobacco is a really interesting choice, Nim. Not something I had considered, but it makes a lot of sense. Though, I think the thrust of the article is that these are technologies that Sterling thinks not only should be replaced but are likely to be. I don't see people giving up tobacco. (Actually, I don't see them giving up nuclear weapons, either.)
Schismatrix is a novel Sterling wrote, and aside from being, in my opinion, fantastic, it imagines a set of manned spaceflight technologies that meet his criteria, among other things.
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
Hmm, I'll PM you instead, so I don't hog the thread.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
Tobacco isn't exactly a technology, just a plant that contains a drug in it. Yes, it certainly has widespread effects, not just to those who smoke. I think, though, that unlike coal, which has an entire infrastructure built around it, tobacco is simply a product. An influential product, yes, but still just a product.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Minutiae points out the obvious here....
As I light a cigarette and ponder what to type next the though that there are other ways of dying that are just as bad occurs to me. Healthy joggers dropping dead from heart failure, auto accidents, terrorist bombings, to point out a few things.... Although I do try to keep my habit to myself, not smoking around children or non smokers, I find it ironic that things happen in various places that are just as bad. States without motorcycle helmet laws, we must pay for those that have accidents and bump there heads when a simple helmet would have protected the person anyway, is one such example. The multitude of stupid lawsuits that people get in to court, that some idiotic jury agrees with, that only cost everyone more money as the prices for things increase. People that drive like lunitics, kill another driver, then are disabled themselves and collect SSI and what not for being a fucking lunitic....
Posted by Timo (Member # 245) on :
OTOH, there's plenty of technology to tobacco. Were the industrial producing, transportation and marketing of cigarettes to cease for some reason, there is very little chance that the users would start growing their own tobacco instead. It's just not worth the effort; it's far easier and more productive to grow mild drugs, if you are into this green thumb thing to begin with.
All the elements of the tobacco industry could be converted to "beneficial" use if freed from the current applications, so there's some validity to saying that tobacco is "a technology that deserves to die".
Timo Saloniemi
Posted by TSN (Member # 31) on :
"...it's far easier and more productive to grow mild drugs..."
Like pot.
There's got to be some irony in there somewhere...
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
MinutiaeMan: If the guy in the article thinks breast implants are a technology, then smoking is too. The way you convert a plant into a product, adding filters and papers plus a bunch of purposely addictive chemicals. That's a series of stages that have seen a lot of development the last 20 years, newer filters, increased addiction curve. It is absolutely a technology.
The two things that connect smoking and implants are vanity and popularity. I've seen too many stupid guys and girls start smoking just to be around the popular people in school. And girls who get implants to try and patch the holes in their egos, guys who get their lips fattened, lol for the last one.
Ritten mentioned: "heart failure, auto accidents, terrorist bombings"
I won't turn this thread into a smoker-bashing one, I just have to respond to your post.
You don't get heart failure from jogging, jogging is healthy. You get it if you have a bad heart or if you jog too much, or both combined. Even then, it's at random, and from trying to do something good. Smoking is bad from the start.
Auto accidents also happen by chance, bad timing, wrong day to drive while hung-over. Health issues from smoking doesn't exactly come at random, they are inevitable.
Terrorist bombings can't be compared to smoking at all. The one is a phenomena, the other is a habit. All the same, I believe smoking kills more people per year than terrorist bombings.
Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
Just thought of something. I remember hearing a description of fire in Zero-G, that it was spherical and pulsating, very different from ordinary fires.
How about smoke? If you light a cigarette on a shuttle or on the ISS (although it's forbidden, for obvious reasons) would the smoke just gather around the tip of the cigarette, growing slowly like a cotton ball in water?
Posted by Wraith (Member # 779) on :
I'm not sure exactly what would happen but I imagine the convection currents would make it spread out a lot more than you're suggesting.
Posted by Veers (Member # 661) on :
Congratulations, Mr. Liwei. Posted by The359 (Member # 37) on :
So how long until they're on the moon?
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
quote:Originally posted by Veers: Congratulations, Mr. Liwei.
Uh... that's Mister YANG. The Chinese put the family name first, remember?
At any rate, I'm sincerely glad to know that their mission has been successfully launched. Here's hoping that the world's first taikonaut returns home safely.
(On a humorous note, when I control-clicked on the word "taikonaut" to add it to my spellchecker's list of words, it recommended the word "takeout" instead. Chinese takeout, Chinese taikonaut, what's the difference?)
The Reuters article has a rather amusing anecdote about the ancient Chinese aspirations for spaceflight:
quote: China invented gunpowder and legend holds that a Ming dynasty (1368-1644) official named Wan Hu attempted the world's first space launch. He strapped himself to a chair with kites in each hand as 47 servants lit 47 gunpowder-packed bamboo tubes tied to the seat.
When the smoke had cleared, Wan was found to have been obliterated. But the dream was not.
There's a diagram of the Shenzhou at the bottom.
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
So China actually had the first space age related deaths, a bit before anyone else....
Posted by Harry (Member # 265) on :
Sorry for being a bit offtopic, but this isn't really worth it's own topic:
Just went to Space.com for some info on the Chinese trip, but instead ended up here. It's a Sternbach design Posted by Jason Abbadon (Member # 882) on :
Impressive.....a Sternbach design without a notch at the nose. Posted by Nim (Member # 205) on :
So Yang Liwei is up there right now? When is reentry?
Posted by The359 (Member # 37) on :
He was supposed to land this morning, haven't seen anything about it though.
Posted by MinutiaeMan (Member # 444) on :
No, he's landing at 2200 GMT (0600 local time, and 1800 EDT).
Posted by The359 (Member # 37) on :
I got the times confused...
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
Well, if your in the area of the landing you were quite correct....
Posted by Cartman (Member # 256) on :
"Chinese takeout, Chinese taikonaut, what's the difference?"
Knowing the Chinese, they'll probably open a takeout restaurant onboard their station as soon as it's in orbit. B)
Posted by Ritten (Member # 417) on :
dang, that is a pretty stereotypical ethnical remark.... I am surprised....
Posted by The359 (Member # 37) on :
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