Behold, a man who eats only sunlight. Plenty of it down in Crawford.
I think that the buttermilk is cheating myself, but it would still be a harsher regimen than Mother Sheehan’s current one of fasting on malts.
Get Cindy Sheehan This Guy’s Number
Behold, a man who eats only sunlight. Plenty of it down in Crawford.
I think that the buttermilk is cheating myself, but it would still be a harsher regimen than Mother Sheehan’s current one of fasting on malts.
Overconstrained
Keith Cowing writes about the inflexibility and fragility of the Shuttle (a subject near and dear to my own heart).
NASA’s current launch dilemma began to develop much along the lines of the 70’s movie – based on the 60s novel “Marooned” where a hurricane threatened the launching of a rescue mission to an orbiting space station. When things got tough – the Russians helped out – at the last minute. Things are not as dire this time around, but the confluence of various facts would make for a good book someday.
Weather has always been an issue for launched from Florida – and it always will be. Russians will be as obstinate as they can get away with so long as they are in the equation for American human spaceflight aboard the ISS.
Given that NASA seeks to used “shuttle derived” architecture and hardware – and launch it from KSC – it has more or less guaranteed that such uncertainties will remain part of human spaceflight for decades to come.
I disagree with him though, that the lessons to be learned are from the Russians, who have developed only a slightly less expensive, and slightly more robust system.
Until we develop a truly robust and low-cost space transportation infrastructure (with full redundancy in vehicles and vehicle types), spaceflight will remain expensive, and rare.
Back To The Future
Will the future be like the fifties, in which we have to shop for fallout shelters?
We have stark choices ahead of us. It will be very costly to prevent Iran from getting nukes (and to prevent North Korea from proliferating them). It may be even more costly not to do so. And many on the left seem to have their heads firmly buried in…errr…the sand.
Maybe It Can Keep Up The Trend
The storm track has shifted east again. Now we’re almost right in the bullseye, with the track having the eye go right over the house. The only good thing will be that, if the trend continues, it will start to move away from us (which doesn’t mean it won’t hit us directly, of course, since this is all probabilistic). The bad news is that the farther east it is, the more powerful it will get, because it will be out over the warm Bahamian waters getting fueled, and it also means more chance for damaging storm surge on the Florida east coast.
Not One Sided
Chris Mooney emails me to tell me that his book, about the so-called “Republican War On Science,” has been released in paperback today, with a new introduction and call to arms against ID.
As I told Chris, while I disagree with a lot of the things that Republicans do with respect to science, I think that the war is more than bi-partisan. Democrats and so-called “progressives” peddle a lot of junk science toward their own agendas, and arguably (and historically) do it even more than Republicans (e.g., think the eugenics movement). Lysenko wasn’t a “right winger,” after all…
In fact, it might be interesting to have a blog debate on this topic. I don’t think we’d resolve quantitatively who is worse, but I suspect that we could convince a lot of people that there’s plenty of guilt to go around.
Anyway, go get the book, if you haven’t, and judge for yourself.
[Update in the evening]
Chris has kindly offered to consider a debate. But if I do that (not definite yet) I’d have to read his book first. A review copy is on the way.
Israel’s Tet Offensive, Second Attempt
For some weird reason, the previous post on this topic was drawing spammers like flies to Michael Moore before his semi-annual bath. So if you do have any comments on it, post them here.
Israel’s Tet Offensive, Second Attempt
For some weird reason, the previous post on this topic was drawing spammers like flies to Michael Moore before his semi-annual bath. So if you do have any comments on it, post them here.
Israel’s Tet Offensive, Second Attempt
For some weird reason, the previous post on this topic was drawing spammers like flies to Michael Moore before his semi-annual bath. So if you do have any comments on it, post them here.
Killing Themselves With Safety
NASA needs to get on with the program and get rid of the daylight restriction:
NASA could reconsider restricting this flight to times when the shuttle and external tank, upon separation, are lit by the sun. That was a post-Columbia rule intended to provide good pictures of the tank and its insulating foam to make sure safety changes worked to eliminate dangerous debris. It was supposed to be in place for the first two post-Columbia launches. After the 2005 return to flight mission saw a large piece of foam debris, NASA decided this third post-Columbia flight also would be limited to daylit launch opportunities. If NASA sticks to the rule, there could be just three days the rest of 2006 meeting all safety requirements. Indeed, it could be February before another viable launch window exists that meets the daylight and other flight rules. NASA officials on Sunday were given the opportunity to rule out the possibility of simply eliminating the daylight launch restriction for this flight, the agency did not rule it out. That could open many more days in the latter half of the year to avoid a potential five-month delay in the resumption of space station construction.
Emphasis mine.
They know they have the capability to inspect at ISS now, and most of the major foam fears should be laid to rest. They need to fly as often as possible, particularly given that it’s hurricane season.