Simple Question for MoonMan

[Moon Man]

tofu said:

You're right, I do not know Ken Mattingly. I said that I did in order to call his bluff. It went like this:

MoonMan: astronaut's are all lyars. I will pay with money for a lie decktor test!!!111

Me: okay, here you go, pay for a test.

MoonMan: um, uh, well, I need a phone number. And CNN has to be there two!!

This post should be moved to a new thread and stickied forever. I told you that you were a liar.

[Moon Man]

sts60 said:

Moon Man, why don't we put aside the first few posts. I myself would like to know if you think the Space Shuttle really works, or is a hoax. Did you know that NASA documents back from around 1980 claim a Shuttle flight rate of 160 flights per year, but even before the post-Columbia standdown there were only a few flights per year? Does that make you think it's a hoax, i.e., that the Shuttle doesn't actually go into orbit? Did you know that the Shuttles originally flew without semiconductor memory in their computers? (The memory chips in your computer are semiconductor chips.) Does that make you think it's a hoax?

Other than a few short space hops I believe America never put a man in space until the first shuttle launch in 1980 or 81, whichever it was. I believe the shuttle and NASA's low earth orbit space program is real.

Someone on here or BAUT said Apollo was canceled due to budget constraints. I disagree. It was canceled because the hoax was out of control. The Apollo missions to be canceled were already budgeted for, which is why we knew about them. How could they be canceled in 72 and yet a few years later 160 missions a year are announced if it was budget constrains..?

It's not believable.

The shuttles first flight was in 80 or 81. Therefore, it was designed and delivered prior to its first flight. When was the shuttle built..? How could it be built if NASA budget was canceled or reduced in 72..?

Why would a design be made that cannot leave earth orbit, 250 miles or so, when Apollo was travelling over 250,000 miles..? The shuttle has never gone higher then 400 miles, I think it is.

Clearly a giant leap backwards for man, or else a Apollo was just a giant myth for mankind.

[gregtj]

I like many others was dissapointed when the last Apollo missions were cancelled. I thought it was a bad decision, but there you go. As has been pointed out already, the money that would have gone to the final moon missions was put into development of the shuttle. The race was over. The U.S. won. Public interest (which = funding) dropped off. Apollo was cancelled. NOT Nasa's budget. The shuttle wasn't made for moon flights. That was not its purpose. It was suppossed to be a cheaper re-usable "space-truck" for delivering payloads to low Earth orbit. That it didn't work out that way is a matter of record, but has little to do with Apollo. Many believe the shuttle was a mistake, but thats another argument, and really doesnt apply here.

What does apply is that you believe in the shuttle. So much of the technology used in the shuttle (such as explosive bolts to name just one) are carryovers from Apollo, so that should help you get your mind around that fact the the technology was there FOR Apollo. Again, this stuff isn't new.

[lonewulf]

Quoting Moon Man:

Why would a design be made that cannot leave earth orbit, 250 miles or so, when Apollo was travelling over 250,000 miles..? The shuttle has never gone higher then 400 miles, I think it is.

Okay, this suggests a lack of knowledge with how engines in space works.

You see, on earth, we have something called gravity to work against. A flying ship needs continual thrust; if a jet suddenly shut off its engine, the jet would start to fall to the earth.

However, space is the opposite. There is no air resistance, and gravity is pretty much a minor concern. You can get away with not needing continual thrust; if you put in 1MPH thrust for one hour, then you'll be moving a mile per minute. If you put it in for 60 hours, then you'll be moving a mile per second.

Alternatively, if you move 1 Mile per second for 2 seconds, you'll be moving 2 MPS... and you won't stop until you get the exact same thrust on the opposite end, or you crash.

[scooter]

"We need a hatch with explosive bolts"...from the movie "The Right Stuff". And the Mercury (early 60s) astronauts got them, ask John Glenn, and the rest, about their skinned knuckles when hitting the actuator after splashdown...

The shuttle, the politics involved, a nightmare. But, basically, it was a NASA/government decided change in direction, in very simplistic terms. NASA, in the meantime, IMHO, did a hell of a job with it...

Dave

[tofu]

moonman said:

I believe the shuttle and NASA's low earth orbit space program is real.

IMPOSSIBLE!

Take a look at this website:
www.boeing.com/defense-space/space/propul/SSMEamaz.html

That website claims that the fuel that the shuttle's engines use is -453 degrees Fahrenheit! Where do they store something like that? If they store it in tanks it would freeze the tanks solid and they would break like glass!

That website also says that the engine exhaust is 6000 degrees Fahrenheit!! The website says that's hot enough to melt metal. Oh yeah? Well what are the engines made of? Metal!! Why don't the engines melt then??

It's simply not believable to me that any of this could work, and if you believe that the shuttle is real, and not a hoax, I'd like to see you prove it to me.

[sts60]

Other than a few short space hops I believe America never put a man in space until the first shuttle launch in 1980 or 81, whichever it was.

You seem to have forgotten Skylab. But then again, I think you're much too young too remember that. Anyway, Americans spent months aboard the U.S.'s first space station, which was an easy naked-eye object and whose radio transmissions would have been easy to track.

I believe the shuttle and NASA's low earth orbit space program is real.

But this is inconsistent, because the same principles and much of the same technology are the basis for all manned spaceflight. Moreover, you can't say why the parts you don't believe in aren't real, or rather, everything you do say is wrong. So your belief carries no weight.

Someone on here or BAUT said Apollo was canceled due to budget constraints. I disagree. It was canceled because the hoax was out of control.

No. You keep saying that this obviously proves a hoax or that obviously does, but if true this would have been so obvious that the average eighth-grader could have figured it out. More missions would have made no difference, especially as the public's attention had already left Apollo. That's why the last flights were cancelled. No public support = no politicians interested = no $.

The Apollo missions to be canceled were already budgeted for, which is why we knew about them.

No. We knew about them because they were planned and because NASA had been talking about them.

How could they be canceled in 72 and yet a few years later 160 missions a year are announced if it was budget constrains..?

It's not believable.

In a sense, I agree; the 160 flights per year was not believable; it was based on too-optimistic views of the durability, complexity management, budget, and missions. It had become apparent by the time the Shuttle flew that such a flight rate would never be achieved.

The shuttles first flight was in 80 or 81. Therefore, it was designed and delivered prior to its first flight.

Uh, yeah... I'd have to say that most aircraft tend to be designed and delivered prior to their first flight.

When was the shuttle built..?

Why don't you do your own research for a change?

How could it be built if NASA budget was canceled or reduced in 72..?

No, you don't understand, and you haven't bothered to research the topic. The Apollo budget was cut, and NASA had to stick to a single man-rated vehicle; they sold the Shuttle as the do-anything (sort of), reusable (mostly), cheap (definitely not), quick-turnaround (definitely not) space truck which would enable all sorts of tremendous progress in space. But the Shuttle couldn't be turned around that fast after a flight, not by a long shot, and the U.S. public had already grown cynical and bored with space.

So the space station was sold as the project enabled by the Shuttle and the Shuttle was resold as the enabler for the station. That was politically useful for dragging funding out for years, but terribly damaging for the space program's spirit and vitality.

[Why would a design be made that cannot leave earth orbit, 250 miles or so, when Apollo was travelling over 250,000 miles..? The shuttle has never gone higher then 400 miles, I think it is.

This question makes no sense. The Shuttle is suppose to haul stuff into Earth orbit. Apollo was designed to take men to the Moon and back. You might as well ask why a cargo helicopter can't fly nonstop to Asia from Houston.

Clearly a giant leap backwards for man, or else a Apollo was just a giant myth for mankind.

Not really a giant leap backward. Just running in place.

[PhantomWolf]

How could they be canceled in 72...

They weren't. Apollo 21, and 22 were cancelled early in 1969 due to budget reasons (and Nixon wanting a way to get rid of the Kennedy Democratic space plan and replace it with his own.) Apollo 18, 19 and 20 were cancelled in late 1970 after the Apollo 13 accident for many reasons including budget and saftey.

[gwiz]

moonman said:

Other than a few short space hops I believe America never put a man in space until the first shuttle launch in 1980 or 81, whichever it was. I believe the shuttle and NASA's low earth orbit space program is real.

What did the Soyuz dock with in the Apollo-Soyuz project in 1975?

[PhantomWolf]

gwiz said:

moonman said:

Other than a few short space hops I believe America never put a man in space until the first shuttle launch in 1980 or 81, whichever it was. I believe the shuttle and NASA's low earth orbit space program is real.

What did the Soyuz dock with in the Apollo-Soyuz project in 1975?

I guess all the Aussies that had parts of Skylab just miss them were imagining things too.

[JayUtah]

I believe the shuttle and NASA's low earth orbit space program is real.

Then how do you account for the fact that it was built using Apollo technology? You keep telling us the technology won't work, but things like propulsion and space suits that you argue won't work for Apollo seem to work just fine for the space shuttle.

Someone on here or BAUT said Apollo was canceled due to budget constraints. I disagree. It was canceled because the hoax was out of control.

Circular. You're using the presumption of a hoax to try to prove the existence of a hoax.

The Apollo missions to be canceled were already budgeted for, which is why we knew about them.

Um, no, they were scheduled. The budget is reviewed each year.

How could they be canceled in 72 and yet a few years later 160 missions a year are announced if it was budget constrains..?

First because the space shuttle people were optimistic, and second because shuttle missions were intended to cost far less than Apollo missions.

It's not believable.

No, you just don't believe it. And you don't believe it because you decided ahead of time you wouldn't believe it, before you actually studied anything.

How could it be built if NASA budget was canceled or reduced in 72..?

You're trying to oversimplify the notion of "budget cut". To cut something from the budget does not mean that less overall money will be made available. It simply means that some particular project is no longer funded. When we say that Apollos 18, 19, and 20 were canceled due to "budget cuts" we don't necessarily mean that the money that would have paid for those flights was removed from NASA's accounts. Congress sets budgets for federal agencies that determine what those agencies will do. It's not just a matter of dumping billions of dollars into a bank account and letting the agency do whatever it wants with the funds.

Why would a design be made that cannot leave earth orbit, 250 miles or so...

Because that is the nature of design.

Why would Detroit design a four-passenger vehicle when it is already possible to design a large tractor trailer that can carry many tons of cargo? The shuttle was designed for certain kinds of missions.

Clearly a giant leap backwards for man, or else a Apollo was just a giant myth for mankind.

Yes, many of us consider the shuttle a leap backward. It promised a lot but failed to deliver. But why is a step backward precluded in legitimate programs? Especially when you have politicians controlling things and riding the high-frequency whims of public opinion, why would you expect that there will always be monotonic progress forward?

[Count Zero]

jayutah said:

It's not just a matter of dumping billions of dollars into a bank account and letting the agency do whatever it wants with the funds.

Personally, I think that would be a better way to do things, but far be it for any legislature to reduce the amount of power they wield...

Not to thread-hijack, or anything.

[JayUtah]

In NASA's case that would be a blessing. Congress has long used NASA's budget as a pork barrel. NASA gets line items in their budget that have nothing to do with aeronautics or astronautics, such as funding space museums in the 5,000-person town in which some Congressman grew up.

But the point remains that if Congress deletes the line items for some project in NASA's budget, NASA is no longer authorized to work on it even if it's a good idea. And if a project appears as a line item in the budget, NASA is compelled to work on it.

I've often argued that taxation without representation would be cheaper.