Celestia Forums

Now is more or less official:NASA don??t have enough money to defend us against dangerous asteroids,or to research about it.After several unbeliveably NASA budget cuts,we will have to wait for private efforts,but since a colision with an asteroid is only a possibility,is highly unlikely.This happen because George W Bush wants THE IMPOSSIBLE:wipe out the terrorism.It is a neverending "war" and if someone don??t do anything,the scientific development of USA and maybe almost the entire world will be severely reduced and everyone will suffer the consequences...maybe even the bird flu research could be affected...

Guess what... NASA *never* had enough money to perform this task. Yes, the military budget is remarkably inflated; it always has been. But even before the Iraq war there was not enough earmarked for the agency to do such a comprehensive survey, never mind come up with a proper defense.

Nothing new in that press announcement.

NASA would probably have enough money to keep an eye on the big rocks, and consider deflection strategies, if only it would settle with the yurpeans, the red bastards and the azns. However - as per my whining on the other thread - they're not ready to do that.

Come to think of it, many people would rather accept the small chance of being hit by a several-billions ton piece of junk flying around at >30000 kph than deal with europeans.

Scytale wrote:NASA would probably have enough money to keep an eye on the big rocks, and consider deflection strategies, if only it would settle with the yurpeans, the red bastards and the azns. ...
Come to think of it, many people would rather accept the small chance of being hit by a several-billions ton piece of junk flying around at >30000 kph than deal with europeans.

Being Italian, and so European, thank you for your kind words.
Anyhow, perhaps you don't know that starting on Jan 1, 2007, Romania is the 27th member of the European Union.
Sorry for you, but now you too are European.
Bye

Andrea

Scytale wrote:NASA would probably have enough money to keep an eye on the big rocks, and consider deflection strategies, if only it would settle with the yurpeans, the red bastards and the azns. However - as per my whining on the other thread - they're not ready to do that.

Come to think of it, many people would rather accept the small chance of being hit by a several-billions ton piece of junk flying around at >30000 kph than deal with europeans.

no... it wouldn't. NASA's budget has *never* been tailored towards this search, not to the degree that would satisfy the scientists involved. And there is already a large degree of international cooperation. There will never be full cooperation, however, because there are completely different entities involved. And, despite all of our wishes to the contrary, these different agencies (NASA< ESA, China, Russia) simply do things differently. It has nothing to do with "not wanting to deal with the Europeans". That's a silly statement, really, considering the amount of cooperation that has already gone on.

@ANDREA: I'm sure you realize there was a hefty dose of sarcasm somewhere in my post... and just a placid fyi, I don't think there's a soul in Romania who doesn't know that we've joined the EU on Jan 1st

Dollan wrote:....

Well, first things first, obviously the degree of transatlantic cooperation is not satisfactory. And I'll point at the different (and redundant - in the bad, evil, wasteful sense) strategies of getting to LEO and to the Moon, and at the recent blooper with tracking down asteroids.

There's definitely more room for intl cooperation, and there's definitely scope for full cooperation. The Union has demonstrated that national space agencies can in fact pile their pennies together for the common goal. So if it can be done at a paneuropean level, why can't they do it at a transatlantic level? You'll read things like "well NASA can't do that because of defense industry's and govt. agencies' hands in their pockets" or "compared to the national space agencies in Europe, NASA's a giant", but these are all irrelevant and plain silly when you contemplate the possibility of going to the Moon, or deflecting asteroids.

Hence my sarcasm - if you take away the silly reasons (like bureaucracy), military reasons (Europe is an asset in the US defense strategy, not a threat), political reasons (Apophis doesn't care whether the social democrats in Paris can deal with the republicans in Washington or not), the conclusion is that they're reluctant to deal with europeans.

Scytale wrote:@ANDREA: I'm sure you realize there was a hefty dose of sarcasm somewhere in my post... and just a placid fyi, I don't think there's a soul in Romania who doesn't know that we've joined the EU on Jan 1st

Sorry for my misunderstanding, but when speaking of political problems, and moreover in such a strong way, IMHO it's better to use emoticons, in order to clarify the sense of your speech.
Bye

Andrea

Scytale wrote:Hence my sarcasm - if you take away the silly reasons (like bureaucracy), military reasons (Europe is an asset in the US defense strategy, not a threat), political reasons (Apophis doesn't care whether the social democrats in Paris can deal with the republicans in Washington or not), the conclusion is that they're reluctant to deal with europeans.

You're still ignoring all of the cooperation that *is* going on, and which has gone on in the past.

Regardless, you can't simply wish away the political, military, and beaurocratic reasons which do indeed trip up relations quite often. If you could, then there would be no problems at all in the world, and full cooperation would already be in place!

In order to be realistic, you have to accept the current level of cooperations, and work towards more. But I submit that FULL cooperation will never happen. A shame, I agree, but there it is.

I find it unfortunate that NASA will lack the funding. But, since when should this effort all fall on NASA's shoulders? In my eyes, every nation on Earth should be required to pony-up some cash and partisipate in the effort along with time-donation for use of technology resources. After all - it's a global threat right?