Category Archives: Technology and Society
Self-Assembling Robots
If you could put a reaction control system into them to allow them to rendezvous with each other, you might have some interesting fractionated satellites.
This is a good example of Arthur C. Clarke’s rule that when a distinguished elder scientist says that something can’t be done, he’s very likely wrong.
A Deadly Accident In Space
There will be one:
You might depart the theater after Gravity with mixed emotions about going to space yourself. Cuaron’s tracking shots and sweeping vistas of the blue marble below evoke a sort of spiritual response, especially in the spaces between suspense when the movie gets quiet. Of course, the Bullock and Clooney spend much of the film spinning and flailing in mortal danger, dodging hunks of metal that become ballistic missiles at orbital speed. Jones sees Gravity as appearing amid a rising wave of interest in space brought on by the emerging private space industry, and that’s a hopeful trend. But humanity has to be realistic about risk assessment, and ready for the high drama of trying to rescue space travelers after a disaster in orbit. Perhaps when space travel becomes common, and not simply the domain of professional astronauts, we’ll treat space disasters like plane crashes—tragedies that can be made extremely uncommon, but never eliminated. And that will be a good thing.
Yes. That’s the fundamental premise of my book.
Manual Transmissions
Cars that only come with them. They aren’t dead yet.
America’s Greatest Days Lie Ahead
Freeing Our Minds For Space Missions
Bob Clark has some politically incorrect thoughts on how to get back to the moon.
Nuclear Power’s Future
It may be small reactors.
The industry is a mess because the government has been inhibiting innovation in it for decades, since the beginning.
The Mother Of All Trainwrecks
…has arrived.
Plus, Crashapalooza on the exchanges.
[Update a while later]
What ObamaCare and the debt limit have in common.
#BreakingBad
I’m guessing it will be hard to have #Sex after the finale, unless you’re #Evil.
Yes, this was a post made for #Twitter.
Eight Minutes To Launch
Things are looking good for a Falcon-9R launch from Vandenberg. I’ll be watching for it from the balcony in Redondo Beach.
[Update a while later]
Looks like everything went perfectly. Just waiting to hear if they had a successful relight and splashdown of the first stage. We didn’t see it from our place, though. Not sure if the house next door was blocking, or what. Next time we’ll go to the beach.