future of space program
so obama’s budget cuts has constellation amongst the programs being cut. constellation was the program that was supposed to follow up the space shuttle program (ending this year) with the goal of getting man to the moon again by 2020.
supposedly the plan is for NASA to invest in space technology research and pay private companies to develop the technologies instead of doing it themselves. NASA outsourcing!!
i don’t know how much it costs to send a man to the moon. i imagine it’s pretty expensive. so those private companies that millionaires pay to get them into space… they might not be making a profit when they charge millions for the ride. but i wonder if in the future, if NASA is going to end up having to pay a private company a fortune each time (after all, those companies have to be able to make money too so they won’t be charging at just cost) they try to send someone to space. if it’s just going to be spending more money later (to buy private companies), i’d rather NASA just keep its own program and forget funding private companies.
does that make me less capitalist? i think i’m just biased because i’ve always loved space and astronauts and going to the moon, etc. etc.
February 5th, 2010 at 12:23 am
A private company has already reached space.
http://www.scaled.com/index.html
Buzz Adrin’s take:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/buzz-aldrin/president-obamas-jfk-mome_b_448667.html
February 5th, 2010 at 12:27 pm
i knew a private company had made it out to space, but i thought they charged a ridiculous amount of money to take people out there (at least billionaries and celebrities like lance bass =P) but i also didn’t know how much NASA spent to send people to space. i figured it was a lot but i wasn’t sure if it was more or less than what the private companies charged… i figured less since the private company has to make a profit right?
the buzz aldrin article was very interesting. the way he described it makes it sound like a good idea… no more monopoly on space, create new companies and jobs. i hope that does happen… but i’m more interested in just getting more space exploration! and for whatever reasons, i am very country pride-ish… i want to cheer on the americans in their race to the moon/mars/pluto against the commies like i cheer for the americans at the olympics! (i don’t know why i’m so into it…) free market be damned! <– i’m just kidding about that. kind of… it is much easier to cheer for a country than it is for a company.