Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!bfmny0!tneff From: tneff@bfmny0.UU.NET (Tom Neff) Newsgroups: sci.space.shuttle Subject: Are We Exploring Space? (was Re: Fourth Shuttle?) Message-ID: <14994@bfmny0.UU.NET> Date: 13 Dec 89 16:28:58 GMT References: <6795@shlump.nac.dec.com> <1989Dec12.022557.6690@utzoo.uucp> <14990@bfmny0.UU.NET> <1989Dec13.044849.12140@utzoo.uucp> Reply-To: tneff@bfmny0.UU.NET (Tom Neff) Lines: 48 In article <1989Dec13.044849.12140@utzoo.uucp> henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) writes: >>>1755 EST, Dec 14, 1972: human >>>exploration of space terminates >> >>After all, why send humans when Soviets will do? > >Send them where? On death-defying missions into the depths of space, >300km up? The human *exploration* of space ended with Apollo 17. Low >Earth orbit was quite well explored rather earlier. Visited != explored. LEO has been a locus of convenience for things staring at the earth (satellites) or contemplating their own navels (Mercury, Gemini) or heading farther out (Apollo) -- only rarely (Skylab, Mir, certain STS missions) has it been explored itself. We are just beginning to learn some very basic things about that environment, as witness the SciAm "glow" article and the LDEF excitement. By the way, 300km up is quite as "death defying" as the lunar surface. Every space fatality has occurred lower than 300km. (All fatalities period, come to think of it!) The notion of "exploration" that says human bootprints are all that count is essentially antique, yet many supposedly forward-looking space enthusiasts embrace it. Bootprints are a prestige frill, good for melodrama and TV specials, but a suited human is a poor data gatherer, and the billion-dollar labyrinth of supporting technology it takes to get him there is an astonishingly inefficient investment for the data returned. In the 80's, American and Soviet manned exploration of space was confined to building infrastructure while deep probes revolutionized our picture of the Solar System. In the 90's with the Great Observatories and the next generation of deep probes, our detailed exploration of the universe will "really" begin. (With any luck, each generation will feel it is "really" beginning this task!) One hopes that before the 90's end we will move to the next phase in human research on orbit and on the Moon. I suspect someone is going to have to kick our aerospace bureaucracy in the pants before America participates meaningfully, however. Everyone seems to want to kick Moondust around, but I notice very few proposals to send human crews on a Solar Polar mission or out to explore the heliopause! Any volunteers for a personal visit to the source of the Cosmic Background radiation?? I mean come on, can't humans do this stuff better than yucky unmanned hardware?? :-) -- "UNIX should be used :: Tom Neff or as an adjective." -- AT&T :: ...uunet!bfmny0!tneff (UUCP only)