Category Archives: Space

Business, Economics, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

A Space Program For The Rest Of Us

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In the process of looking for something else, I ended up rereading this essay I wrote a decade ago, as an open letter to the Augustine panel. I have to confess pleasure at how well it’s held up, and how things are proceeding as I foretold, despite Congress. Note that it also presaged my book, which I wrote a few years later.

[Update a few minutes later]

Heh, I just got to this part; I anticipated and advocated for the new Space Development Agency:

Just as war is too important to be left to the generals, man’s future in space is too important to be left to NASA. After President Reagan proposed the creation of a national missile defense system in 1983, it became clear that the U.S. Air Force was not properly organized or motivated — and so a new agency was created to pursue the president’s vision. The new agency, today called the Missile Defense Agency, was very innovative and made great progress because it could focus on its one goal. Along those lines, the Bush administration might have done well to establish an Office of Space Development (with “exploration” being merely a means to an end) that could draw on other federal resources — not just NASA, but the Departments of Defense and Energy — as well as the private sector.

It’s also ironic, in light of criticism of him in the essay, that Mike Griffin is heading it up.

Business, Economics, Law, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

The SLS Saga

Over at The Space Review, Jeff Foust has the story on last week’s events.

[Update a few minutes later]

Also over there a sort of debate on the pros and cons of NASA’s approach to getting back to the moon. I’d note that Hedman’s objection to transpiration cooling is both weak (in the sense that even if Starship was expended, it would still deliver more payload for much less money than SLS ever will) and moot, since Elon has stated that with the steel and standard thermal protection, they may only use it in areas that are scorched when they return.

General Science, History, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Science And Society, Space, Space Science, Technology and Society

The Younger Dryas

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It was apparently much worse than we thought:

As Kennett noted in a recent article in The Current (a university press maintained by UCSB), the crater would have led to widespread destruction, characterized by biomass burning, megafaunal extinctions and global cooling. “It’s much more extreme than I ever thought when I started this work,” he said. “The more work that has been done, the more extreme it seems.”


The discovery was made possible by a Chilean group of scientists who were studying sediment layers at the well-know Quaternary paleontological and archaeological site, known as Pilauco Bajo. Years ago, these scientists recognized changes in the sediment record that were associated with the YDB impact event.

These included a “black mat” layer that coincides with the disappearance of South American megafauna fossils and human artifacts dated to the Pleistocene (12,800 years ago), indicating a severe shift in the climate. This was a major find since the vast majority of evidence for the YDB Impact has been found in the northern hemisphere.

Imagine that happening today. And here we’re obsessing over two degrees Celsius.

Better get moving on that vital SLS, so we can protect ourselves. #NotReally

Business, Economics, Law, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Space, Technology and Society

NASA’s “Inability” To Do Space Assembly

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A righteous Twitter rant from Phil Metzger:

Follow the thread. He lambastes the Alabama delegation, and how this actually harmed Alabama. He’s right. It’s tragic.