Pork before Hubble

[Al]

At a time when we throw hundreds of billions of dollars for more and more porK: We have decided that fixing Hubble is to expensive And we scrapped plans to build the largest Particle Collider a few years ago.

Yet we can afford to look after the northern migrating herds of uneducated by providing education, hospitalization and other services. O well..what would a banana Republic need a Particle Collider or a Hubble anyway

HUBBLE

 

[Shannow]

Al,
that's a lot of capital to talk about "destroying safely".

Having spent so much getting it there in the first palce, there should be an outrage against plans to destroy it.

 

[Pablo]

sometimes, just sometimes.....I think therefore I think some more....

 

[Al]

Yea..technology is our saving grace in this country and then we can't afford to keep Hubble up and no Particle Collider. You can't believe the depth of my frustration with the morons in charge of this country.

But fortunately we cannot afford another failed program like "No Child Left Behind"

 

[Shannow]

Al, I hope our countries still get along so well when we are amongst the ranks of the thrid world

 

[Rick in PA]

Saw that news.

They want to control de-orbit it.

Wouldn't it make sense to get a bigger-better replacement up in space first.

Oh, yeah, we're off to Mars.

 

[Mystic]

To some extent the new ground observatories can replace Hubble. They have some incredible new technology, massive telescopes, and the ground observatories cost a lot less. But I can't see just destroying Hubble by taking it out of orbit. There are still things that can be done even if the telescope was limited to say just infrared astronomy now, or something like that. Somebody has to come up with some ideas.

On the other hand, Hubble is old, and space is a hostile environment. Some of the new ground observatories may actually be able to outperfrom Hubble. If that is truly the case then Hubble is too expensive.

The really ideal place to put some observatories would be on the Moon.

 

[mormit]

At least mothball it in a stable orbit for later use when we can scrape up the cash to revive it. Enough was spent getting Hubble up there and it has more than proven its worth.

Hopefully, by the time my kids are grown, this country can have a balanced budget and try to lead in science and technology again.

 

[Mystic]

There have been some ideas for a kind of inflatable giant telescope that could be used as a replacement for Hubble.

But some of the new ground telescopes use a kind of technology that neutralizes atmospheric problems so that the telescope is almost like it was in space. And these new telescopes are massive. Hubble can see a long way in space, but Hubble is actually a rather small telescope. What the scientists need are massive telescopes that can gather a lot of light to be studied. And radio astronomy is getting more and more important all the time.

Bottom line: They need a realistic study to determine exactly how useful Hubble really is. Pure honesty-no hype. If Hubble has become marginalized by the new technology it is done. If telescopes here on the Earth can now achieve what Hubble can achieve, Hubble is just a waste of money. But I still can't see just letting it burn up in the atmosphere. And it might as well be run until it breaks down forever.

 

[Al]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mystic:
There have been some ideas for a kind of inflatable giant telescope that could be used as a replacement for Hubble.

But some of the new ground telescopes use a kind of technology that neutralizes atmospheric problems so that the telescope is almost like it was in space. And these new telescopes are massive. Hubble can see a long way in space, but Hubble is actually a rather small telescope. What the scientists need are massive telescopes that can gather a lot of light to be studied. And radio astronomy is getting more and more important all the time.

Bottom line: They need a realistic study to determine exactly how useful Hubble really is. Pure honesty-no hype. If Hubble has become marginalized by the new technology it is done. If telescopes here on the Earth can now achieve what Hubble can achieve, Hubble is just a waste of money. But I still can't see just letting it burn up in the atmosphere. And it might as well be run until it breaks down forever.

---

I certainly agree that maybe if there are better options it makes sense to let it die.

 

[Mystic]

The whole 'Man (Woman) is Space' idea is a waste of money until we have cheaper means of getting into Earth orbit. All kinds of mumbo jumbo are employed to make the manned exploration of space seem necessary but the fact is unmanned spacecraft have already completed a fairly decent exploration of the ENTIRE solar system. Human beings have been to Earth orbit and the Moon and that is it.

Want some examples? Saturn and one of its moons (Titan) are being explored right now by unmanned spacecraft. Now that spacecraft was very expensive and it is unlikely there will be missions like that again. Some fairly cheap unmanned missions could complete our preliminary exploration of the solar system.

Even without any such new missions we have already achieved a reasonably decent early exploration of the solar system.

Unmanned spacecraft can achieve almost everything we need to achieve in space-exploration, communications, weather forecasting, Earth observation, navigation, etc. For safety we need to develop techniques of intercepting and impacting asteroids and comets which could endanger the Earth.

An inflatable space telescope bigger then Hubble could probably be developed and sent into space using an expendable rocket.

I want to explore space as much as anybody and I was interested in the space program from the start. But until we have some safe, efficient, and low cost method of getting into Earth orbit, we can not really even begin the true exploration of space by human beings. Our machines have already been where we would like to go.

 

[mormit]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Mystic:
Bottom line: They need a realistic study to determine exactly how useful Hubble really is. Pure honesty-no hype. If Hubble has become marginalized by the new technology it is done. If telescopes here on the Earth can now achieve what Hubble can achieve, Hubble is just a waste of money. But I still can't see just letting it burn up in the atmosphere. And it might as well be run until it breaks down forever.

---

Yes. Agreed. But we don't want to eliminate option #1 before we have evaluated and concluded that option #2 is the way to go. Complete a realistic comparison first before we scrap it.

 

[srivett]

The only thing hubble has done is bounce real news off of the tv schedule.

Sorry, but it doesn't have any effect on anyones daily life. That money should have been spent on a multitude of different things.

Steve

 

[Al]

quote:

---

Originally posted by srivett:
The only thing hubble has done is bounce real news off of the tv schedule.

Sorry, but it doesn't have any effect on anyones daily life. That money should have been spent on a multitude of different things.
Steve

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In some ways I can agree. But we throw away kazillions on welfare, prison system, "No Child Left Behind", and other wasteful gov. programs. If we can't lead the world on technology we are screwed. Cancelling the Particle Collider doesn't seem to have huge consequandes for you and I for the billions it will cost. But we are losing some of the best world scientists to CERN now and that will have its consequences.

Based on Quantum research it is possible in the forseeable future one Quantum Computer will out perform thousands of supercomputers running in parallel. And this technology has already proved totally secure cryptology is occurring as we speak. Hubbble has had a part in putting pieces of these puzzles together, probably.