Stepan, my Russian, chemist friend and I got into one of those discussions common to rooms full of engineers: the relative benefits of the different ways to go into space. He has a very interesting theory. The mundane part is that it is cheaper to send up rockets than maintain a space shuttle fleet. The really good part is that he is against the private sector getting to deeply into making rockets for space travel.
He says, “Can you imagine, the next thing you know, we will have an atomic exchange between IBM and Cisco!”
As a nerd and space enthusiast, I find this post too short! 😉
What are your thoughts on the subject, Ken? I’m interested in hearing!
For me, I have no problem with the private sector pursuing space launches and travel. After all, if the market isn’t interested in it, it won’t fund it. I do support the idea of a reusable space shuttle/craft, even if it is more expensive than a rocket, because developing and using such a craft will push us to improve the design, driving cost and complexity down for the future. I also think the government should continue to fund and push the space program. I may be all about some small, lean government, but I have an exception here. I think [manned] space exploration is still one of those ‘magical’ things that instills a sense of patriotism in citizens and brings us together, and the good moral of a country is an good investment to make.
Brief soapbox: it’s shameful we haven’t sent people back to the moon since 1972. We should have an outpost there by now and be well on our way toward having one on Mars. I feel like America has lost her sense of adventure, and that makes me sad.
P.S. Can you make it so that the RSS feed for this site gives the full post instead of just a snippet? Pretty please? 🙂
Hey Kendall, I just switched the RSS feed to “full text”. Let me know if it works for you.
As for NASA, I have very mixed feelings. I know the government is about the only way to get REALLY BIG, long term things going, but I have also sold stuff to and worked with NASA. I think they are really bad at what they do. The giant, private sector contractors do a pretty good job at delivering stuff, but not even close to as good as free market entrepreneurs who are WILDLY better than either of the former. So, the way I see it, the right way to do it is identify one or two BIG things to do at a time like the interstate freeway system, space travel, or some basic research that is too long term to attract the private sector. After that, the idea (IMHO) is to get it down the food chain to the private sector as fast as possible. Example: The Internet! DOD->A bunch of education/government/private sector collaboration->private sector.
As for Stepan’s comments: His IQ is so much higher than mine, I get a nose bleed just thinking about it. He inhabits a world and worldview colored by his upbringing and Russian roots. A lot of his thinking is just so far out of the box, I rarely have any context from within which I can comment coherently.
Thanks, I’ll see if the RSS setting works on your next post. 🙂
How is NASA is bad at what they do? I don’t doubt it, just curious. And why is that the case? Is it because they don’t have to compete? Too much bureaucracy/bloat? Do you think they can ever be good at what they do? Were they ever good at it, even in the ‘glory days’ of the Apollo missions? Just pondering…
I do like your idea of government being very limited in big projects.
It was shortly after the first shuttle started flying. It just seemed like a big bureaucratic monster with engineers that specified stuff and had no fire in the belly. I am pretty confident they were better during Gemini and Apollo, but the institution had lived long enough for the bureaucracy to take over. Even the engineers and scientists seemed to be in bureaucracy mode. All the cool kids wanted to work somewhere else.
Oh, so another Microsoft then.
I love you Microsoft, please don’t crash my computer!
😉
EXACTLY!!!!