NASA = Starfleet?
When it comes to life imitating art imitating life, nothing is more complex than the relationship between NASA and the Star Trek franchise. For example, the first Space Shuttle was named "Enterprise" after ST fans staged a massive write-in contest. In the show "Enterprise" this Enterprise is featured in the opening credits. Furthermore, the second starship commissioned (according to "Enterprise" lore) was named "Challenger" in honor of the real life Space Shuttle Challenger. And let's not forget that ST: IV was dedicated to the crew of the Challenger for "inspiring exploration to the 24th century and beyond" or something like that.
Anyway, this fourth wall-busting circle is now complete. NASA has unveiled their logo for their new spaceship -- the Orion. Orion is also the name of the program to put people back on the moon by 2020. So, what's interesting about this logo? It was designed by Mike Okuda.
Anyway, this fourth wall-busting circle is now complete. NASA has unveiled their logo for their new spaceship -- the Orion. Orion is also the name of the program to put people back on the moon by 2020. So, what's interesting about this logo? It was designed by Mike Okuda.
5 Comments:
Whoah. It's SO 70s.
Is there actually any point to going back to the moon? Get your ass to Mars!
If it motivates Nasa to invent new awesome things (ie velcro, teflon, digital photography, etc.) that will be on the market for us in the future, I'm ok with it.
but the moon is a bit of a waste. And we've lost too much on bombing the middle east to afford to go to mars... or the moon really...
I'm such a space nerd. I've actually read quite a bit about all this recent moon/Mars planning.
They have to go to moon for a few reasons. One, to learn how to live off-world for longer amounts of time and under high-radiation, low-gravity environments. Two to master in-situ resource creation -- mining rocks for oxygen/methane for fuel, etc. Three, to shake-out long duratuon suits and equipment. Four, there's quite a bit of science to be done on the moon that was not accomplished the first time around, e.g. exploring polar regions for ice, looking for the helium-3 isotope, and establishing moon-based telescopes.
If anything, the moon goal will allow the creation of the infrastructure necessary to get us to Mars. It's impossible to tell Congress to pony up 500 billion over 15 years to get us to Mars, but it's quite do-able to have them give NASA 100 billion over 12 years to develop rockets for a Moon mission that can evenutally be scaled for Mars.
As for the issue of money, it really isn't one. NASA's budget is 7/10 of one percent of all the spending the Feds do every year. It's going to stay that way for the next four years. NASA spends 17 billion a year. The military spends 400 billion. Social spending is even higher. Most of the moon money is coming in-house from the Shuttle and Space Station as they shut those projects down.
That is awesome. All of what you just said.
Yay NASA! I'm ok with a little of my taxes going to that.
I should add that to pay for Moon/Mars NASA is also cutting the growth of space science budgets (mars rovers and the like) to practically zero between now and 2010. This is a HUGE debate, and people a zillion times smarter than me fall on all sides of the issue.
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