Non-IT News Thread
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NASA overruns and delays on the James Webb telescope. Now looking like it will exceed their price cap. Making us wonder what a price cap even means, then.
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@mlnews said in Non-IT News Thread:
NASA overruns and delays on the James Webb telescope. Now looking like it will exceed their price cap. Making us wonder what a price cap even means, then.
"Moreover, the agency said it no longer could guarantee that the project would live within an $8 billion cost cap imposed by Congress."
It means that the US taxpayers are going to be force to spend more money for something that has taken way to long, and cost over 16 times it's estimation to even get to this point. . .
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@dustinb3403 The benefits to future generations will be priceless. Today the federal government is spending ten billion dollars. And tomorrow. And yesterday. 8 billion over two decades is nothing.
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@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
8 billion over two decades is nothing.
Ok personally give me 4 Billion every 10 years please. . .
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Might as well be bitching about the money spent on radio wave research 100 years ago as worthless. Research which fundamentally transformed humanity.
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@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
@dustinb3403 The benefits to future generations will be priceless. Today the federal government is spending ten billion dollars. And tomorrow. And yesterday. 8 billion over two decades is nothing.
The benefits of an overpriced, questionably legal telescope? I get it, astronomy is fun and interesting and we should invest in it. But we should invest sensibly. The value of this stuff is negligible. Almost worthless. There are SO many ways that that money could be being used to better humanity in really, really good ways. Ways that might save our planet, instead of looking at ones we wish we could escape to.
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@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
Might as well be bitching about the money spent on radio wave research 100 years ago as worthless. Research which fundamentally transformed humanity.
That wasn't government research, and it was pretty clear what they were working on. This is the opposite of that.
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Actually radio research is a great example. That's what I want, research into things that are cost effective and actually useful to humanity. Not pouring money pointlessly into a corrupt science welfare program propped up as a cold war era propaganda machine.
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@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
Might as well be bitching about the money spent on radio wave research 100 years ago as worthless. Research which fundamentally transformed humanity.
Researching the stars, or sending out "welcome to earth" type practices have very little to do with what we need today. Research better solar power generation, maybe some crazy band around the earth that collects solar energy 24/7.
Put businesses that burn fossil fuels out of business, address the things that are killing the one thing that no matter what, we're stuck on.
The few people (if it ever happens) to escape earth and colonize another planet, will not be you or I. To boot, NASA isn't doing research into terraforming (AFAWK).
So a habitable world isn't even within any astronauts lifetime. The nearest thought to be habitable world is 12 light-years away.
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@scottalanmiller yes it was, no it wasnt, no it isnt.
Not my fault if you dont know the mission of this telescope. It is easily available.
Please provide me a source that shows marconi and others doing this without money from a government institution. These were funded initially by military organizations in Europe and the US. Later after being given patents they started companies to make money and sell things and start radio companies. -
@scottalanmiller said in Non-IT News Thread:
Actually radio research is a great example. That's what I want, research into things that are cost effective and actually useful to humanity. Not pouring money pointlessly into a corrupt science welfare program propped up as a cold war era propaganda machine.
This is a good point, the race to put a satellite in space, the first man to circle the planet, the first people on the moon.
All propaganda.
Now, did it lead us to be able to spy on and create information systems so we can communicate globally at a fraction of the time, sure.
But exploring the (literally) endless space doesn't hold anything that we can realistically use, besides maybe making a map of things that our future robot creations can use to mine. . .
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@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
@scottalanmiller yes it was, no it wasnt, no it isnt.
Not my fault if you dont know the mission of this telescope. It is easily available.
It's mission is to siphon government funds without congressional approval, IMHO. NASA's mission is cold war propaganda, that's literally why it exists. It now has momentum as government systems do to keep taking tax dollars long after it's mission is fulfilled (or failed, in this case.)
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@dustinb3403 said in Non-IT News Thread:
@scottalanmiller said in Non-IT News Thread:
Actually radio research is a great example. That's what I want, research into things that are cost effective and actually useful to humanity. Not pouring money pointlessly into a corrupt science welfare program propped up as a cold war era propaganda machine.
This is a good point, the race to put a satellite in space, the first man to circle the planet, the first people on the moon.
All propaganda.
Now, did it lead us to be able to spy on and create information systems so we can communicate globally at a fraction of the time, sure.
Not really, investing directly in the things we wanted is always dramatically more efficient than investing in marketing and hoping if you through ten billion dollars at a marketing campaign that you will get one million dollars of research.
This is why even in the early 2000s, the US was still relying on Nazi rocket and shuttle designs and hadn't made our own yet. Five years of intentional research did more than almost five decades of tangential research.
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@dustinb3403 said in Non-IT News Thread:
But exploring the (literally) endless space doesn't hold anything that we can realistically use, besides maybe making a map of things that our future robot creations can use to mine. . .
It's useful, just insanely low on the value list compared to communications, health care, food production, carbon emissions reduction, etc. But it's easy to sell as a tax consumption scheme.
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@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
Not my fault if you dont know the mission of this telescope. It is easily available.
From here "The James Webb Space Telescope will find the first galaxies that formed in the early universe and peer through dusty clouds to see stars forming planetary systems. Learn more from the mission's project website. https://jwst.nasa.gov/"
Why the hell do we need to understand and see the light from the very first stars? What is there to gain from this, rather than say practical science of solar generation or space mining systems so we can stop destroying the one place we live on?
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@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
Not my fault if you dont know the mission of this telescope. It is easily available.
Here is the mission: "Webb will be the premier observatory of the next decade, serving thousands of astronomers worldwide. It will study every phase in the history of our Universe, ranging from the first luminous glows after the Big Bang, to the formation of solar systems capable of supporting life on planets like Earth, to the evolution of our own Solar System. "
Value: Zero. Absolute zero.
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@scottalanmiller said in Non-IT News Thread:
@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
@scottalanmiller yes it was, no it wasnt, no it isnt.
Not my fault if you dont know the mission of this telescope. It is easily available.
It's mission is to siphon government funds without congressional approval, IMHO. NASA's mission is cold war propaganda, that's literally why it exists. It now has momentum as government systems do to keep taking tax dollars long after it's mission is fulfilled (or failed, in this case.)
Yeah, that gigantic half a percent of the federal budget going to NASA is really draining us taxpayers dry... better keep spending most of the tax revenue on creating war and conflict 'round the globe where it doesn't exist... it's our only hope.
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@dustinb3403 said in Non-IT News Thread:
@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
Not my fault if you dont know the mission of this telescope. It is easily available.
From here "The James Webb Space Telescope will find the first galaxies that formed in the early universe and peer through dusty clouds to see stars forming planetary systems. Learn more from the mission's project website. https://jwst.nasa.gov/"
Why the hell do we need to understand and see the light from the very first stars? What is there to gain from this, rather than say practical science of solar generation or space mining systems so we can stop destroying the one place we live on?
Jinx. Yes, I've been following the Webb for some time. I find astronomy interesting, but believe it a terribly unethical use of public resources of this nature and believe that this kind of funding is government corruption, just doing welfare without calling it that.
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@scottalanmiller said in Non-IT News Thread:
@dustinb3403 said in Non-IT News Thread:
But exploring the (literally) endless space doesn't hold anything that we can realistically use, besides maybe making a map of things that our future robot creations can use to mine. . .
It's useful, just insanely low on the value list compared to communications, health care, food production, carbon emissions reduction, etc. But it's easy to sell as a tax consumption scheme.
That's my point, where is the value from any sort of project like this? Practical sciences that can affect the world we live in today are much better suited than staring at the stars with the goal of seeing the first stars etc.
Much better uses for the money, no matter how little money it might seem.
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@rojoloco said in Non-IT News Thread:
@scottalanmiller said in Non-IT News Thread:
@momurda said in Non-IT News Thread:
@scottalanmiller yes it was, no it wasnt, no it isnt.
Not my fault if you dont know the mission of this telescope. It is easily available.
It's mission is to siphon government funds without congressional approval, IMHO. NASA's mission is cold war propaganda, that's literally why it exists. It now has momentum as government systems do to keep taking tax dollars long after it's mission is fulfilled (or failed, in this case.)
Yeah, that gigantic half a percent of the federal budget going to NASA is really draining us taxpayers dry... better keep spending most of the tax revenue on creating war and conflict 'round the globe where it doesn't exist... it's our only hope.
The point isn't the money, the original cost for the project was 500 million, to date they've spent something like 16 times the estimation, and are decades behind on the plan.
How has this not been scrapped? If this were a private business they would've gone under decades ago.
Practical sciences. Things that with a simple explanation can offer a "we can reduce CO2" or "we can give everyone free energy" etc.
I'd much rather have substantially better solar panels at a much lower cost, than a fancy picture of some place so far away that no one for the next 20 billion years will see in person.
Edit:
I mean it, I see no value in staring at stars. Work on better communication systems, sure, work on national defence projects, sure.
But as a platform for people to stare at stars? I don't see any way someone can prove value in any practical sense.
