NASA seeks your help and ideas

[nechaus]

NASA has put out a call for ideas for the next Mars mission in 2018.
The fine print: the cost can't be astronomical and the idea has to move the country closer to landing humans on the red planet in the 2030s.

"This is the kickoff," said NASA sciences chief John Grunsfeld.

The race to redraw a new, cheaper road map comes two months after NASA pulled out of a partnership with the European Space Agency on two missions targeted for 2016 and 2018, a move that angered scientists.

The 2018 mission represented the first step toward hauling Martian soil and rocks back to Earth for detailed study - something many researchers say is essential in determining whether microbial life once existed there.
Agency officials said returning samples is still a priority, but a reboot was necessary given the financial reality.
In the past decade, NASA has spent $US6.1 billion exploring Earth's closest planetary neighbour.
US President Barack Obama's latest proposed budget slashed spending for solar system exploration by 21 per cent, making the collaboration with the Europeans unaffordable.
A newly formed team will cull through the ideas and come up with options by summer around the time when NASA's latest mission, a $US2.5 billion car-sized rover Curiosity, will land near the Martian equator. NASA headquarters is the ultimate decider of which future projects to fund.
Whatever mission flies in 2018, it will be vastly cheaper than Curiosity and will be capped at $US700 million.
NASA is mainly seeking suggestions from scientists and engineers around the world, but you don't have to have a Ph.D. Anyone can submit a proposal online and go through a lengthy process.
"Check all the boxes and you may be considered," said NASA spokesman Dwayne Brown.
Scientists welcomed the chance to offer input but worried about the budget uncertainty.
"It will be extremely difficult to plan and implement the next specific steps that will lead to Mars sample return," Arizona State University scientist Jim Bell said in an email. He is part of the rover Curiosity team.

from news.com.au

[Lock]

Some of the NASA objectives seem a little optimistic... Night Rover Challenge here:
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=37580

[MikeFairbanks]

I have a simple idea: Take ten days worth of the Pentagon's budget and give it to NASA. That would double the amount of money they have PER YEAR.

The Pentagon's annual budget is forty times NASA's, which shows that the culture of war is more important that the culture of curiosity.

[amberwolf]

Well ya gotta remember that we gots to protect ourselves from them thar scientists, too, right?

[MikeFairbanks]

It's pretty sad, actually. The Pentagon gets whatever it wants. 84% of income taxes are used for military purposes and we spend more than all the other nations of this planet combined.

And yet the irrational public and politicians are angry about healthcare and retirement income for senior citizens for using federal dollars (even though each of those programs are separately funded and have nothing to do with income taxes).

Bummer.

And, yes, welfare is a problem in this country, but that isn't what's causing huge deficits.

This nations national debt is tied, almost to the penny, to war spending. Every major jump our nation incurred is matched to a dramatic increase in military spending.


NASA's budged it 2.5% of the Pentagon's.

[coldfusion594]

I'm just pissed at how much our government practically just "gives" money away... When the Tsunami struck Japan we gave them some ridiculous amount of money that did not go toward the debt that we already owed them!
Makes no sense to me

[Lessss]

If you were to shut down the entire government all healthcare etc.. except your military you still would not balance you budget.


The TSA has more money than NASA, yes that's right the peep and grope em dept has more funding than NASA.

[Kingfish]

I’d go for the balloon model: No need to trudge around in the dirt and getting mired; just float on over to where you want to prospect, drop down a little mobile unit to take whatever sample, hoist away and off to the next destination. To keep the bird afloat, we crack hydrogen from water with our little RTG unit or maybe passive solar.

Freebird! KF

[MikeFairbanks]

If you were to shut down the entire government all healthcare etc.. except your military you still would not balance you budget.


The TSA has more money than NASA, yes that's right the peep and grope em dept has more funding than NASA.

I don't really agree with your assessment.

I did a huge research project on this last summer, and by my numbers 84% of our income taxes go toward the military. The remaining 16% is not enough to run the government (national parks, transportation, CDC, pay the president, education, arts funding, etc.). Welfare is a lot too, depending on what we consider welfare, since unemployment is paid for by both the states and federal government combined. There's a lot more to it than that, but essentially if we threw out all government spending except for actually running the government offices and defense, we would have enough in taxes to cover it.


Social Security is funded through a completely separate tax (not that most Americans even know that or understand it). It has never been short of money. In fact, much of our national debt is to that program because Congress borrowed money from it.

Medicare is self-funded as well, and has always been funded sufficiently, but with rising health care costs, along with an aging population (Baby Boomers), it is not sustainable using its current formula.


The fix is easy: Raise tax rates on the rich, cut the military budget in half, and you will see the national debt get better quickly.

It really is that simple to fix our nation's annual deficits and overall debt.