[X] My Assistant

[Guest_Richard Trigaux_*]

There was hot debates about wether Moon exploration is to be achieved with manned crews or with unmanned robots. I think the mixed concept exposed here can use both, or be successful even with only one if the other fails.

First, only activities directly linked to lunar ground are useful on this ground: any other would require much less energy in free space. And things like telescopes are better in free space than fixed to a dusty and vibrating ground.

At first, a fixed crewed base on the Moon is useless: once the local geology explored, appears the need to move. (the only exception would be a large drilling project, which would require a fixed crewed base. But we are still far of this. And I don't speak of mining, a pure ideological view if we consider the cost of bringing back materials on Earth)

So we need to move. In order to be able to visit a significant number of targets.

A rover.

A rover like Oppy and Spirit. But much larger, several tons like the LEM, see 20 or 30 tons.

There was on another thread on this forum (I don't remember where) an extensive discution about an automatic remote controlled Moon rover, its requirements and inconveniences. Large solar panels, which need to be cleaned. Full lab for isotope, cristallography and chemical analysis. Even gas analysis (rocks often contain gas bubbles very interesting to study). Such a lab could be miniaturized, but it would remain very complicated to operate and maintain, some said it would be even impossible to made it remote-controled and reliable enough.

Considering all this, I though of a mixed mission concept which would be interesting:
-a large automated rover
-several crewed missions using a smaller LEM to service it.


In remote control, the rover would be able to
-rove on large distances on the Moon (some even suggested to "race the sun" so that to alway have solar energy)
-take samples and make simple analysis.


Manned visits could:
-come on spots of special interest.
-take samples and manipulate them for more complete analysis.
-maintain the rover, bring new instruments or replace damaged parts.
-take back to Earth choosen samples of special interest for most complete analysis.


Concretely, the manned encounters could work that way:
-the manned landing module lands on a spot of interest, while the rover comes along to rendez-vous.
-the rover has a kind or skip or lorry, so that it can haul and carry the manned return stage. The crew can stay into this return stage, or have a larger cabin into the rover. From here they can perform EVA on the ground or for maintaining the rover.
-in this configuration, the rover can stay on the spot or proceed to other places, carying the return stage and the crew.
-when the human presence is no longer required, of if there is an accident, the return stage is fired and it goes directly to Earth (this is a bit more difficut than with the former LEMs, which had only to come back in lunar orbit).


One of the major advantage is that the manned visits don't need to bring each time an heavy luggage of rover, power resources and instruments: once landed, the rover can remain available for many missions.


So the whole thing works like the Hubble space telescope, most of the time in remote control, but with manned service missions. It just has more manned missions, and not just for maintainance. But the number of manned visits can be tailored according to needs and to budgets, from many to zero. Even in the later case the rover still has its interest.


The concept is even politics-friendly, allowing "ideological" manned presence to be really useful, and opposed conceptions (manned/unmanned) to collaborate rather than excluding each other. We can even imagine that he rover (US made, I guess...) could receive manned missions of Europe, Russia or other forms of collaborations.


It would not be interesting to rebuilt a series of the old Saturn V rockets, but I think it would not be difficult to rebuilt a series of a modernized version, using already existing components such as shuttle boosters, reservoirs or engines, together with modern electronics.

A nightmarish automation problem would be a complex automatized sample analysis lab able to stand the comparizon with a real Earth lab. Concretelly the belly of the rover would be organized around a handling "charriot" moving on rails, and able to carry samples from any instrument to any other (analysers, saws, containers...) with the proper orientation and force. The instruments would be mounted on racks, and there would be enough space for an astronaut to operate safely between the instruments, and eventually easily replace any of them, including the charriot. (rails being passive, could be considered reliable). The only real (but really bad) problem in there would be dust.

[Guest_BruceMoomaw_*]

Seriously, unmanned sample return had not been accomplished at the time that 1970 study was done, and since then it has been done to the tune of only a few kg of rock and soil, at most. I'm not saying it couldn't have been done -- I'm saying that the odds of some mechanism becoming jammed by the ubiquitous lunar dust, ruining the mission, were high.

You can't even admit that Apollo ended up as a scientific windfall for exo-geologists, far more so than *any* unmanned program of the time could have returned, can you, Bruce?

Frankly, this sing-song "there is and has never been a single good reason to put men into space" rant of yours is getting a little old, at least with me. And, again frankly, I don't want to live in a world where all humans are told to take a seat on the sidelines and leave the *real* exploring to the robots. That road leads to the end of *all* significant exploration, IMNSHO.

-the other Doug

In reply:

(1) The astronauts themselves had serious trouble with dust. If it had led to a spacesuit failure or an PLSS failure, we would have something a wee bit more serious than the loss of a cheply replaceable unmanned rover. (By the way, by 1970 we already had undersea robots performing very complex underwater tasks successfully. Remember the Palomares H-bomb, and the Nimbus 3 RTGs? And the Moon is a much more congenial environment for robots than the deep sea.)

(2) Just "a few kg" of rock and soil would have been more scientifically valuable overall than the half-ton the astronauts brought back, if it been collected from regions covering hundreds of km across the Moon.

(3) If you think that "real exploration" will come to an end when robots allow us to take our eyes and minds to new locations rather than the difficulty and expense of lugging our bodies along, provide some evidence rather than just saying it, please. Lewis and Clark would have jumped at the opportunity to let their fingers do the walking through the western territories; Columbus would have done likewise. But they didn't have our technology. At some point, of course, new techonologies WILL make it worthwhile to send humans into space, just as new technology eventually made it worthwhile to return to the South Pole. If we do it before then, we will simply be seriously slowing down the progress of human exploration as a whole -- something the FY 2007 NASA budget makes excruciatingly clear.

As for the "scientific windfall" of the Apollo Program, let me add a footnote to my second point by quoting Norman Horowitz on the subject in the March 1990 issue of "The Sciences" (the magazine of the National Academy of Sciences), on Bruce Murray's arguments for a manned deep-space program:

"How plausible is all this? Not very, if one considers the assumptions on which it is based. One assumption is that Apollo was good for science and that therefore a manned Mars mission will also be good. The other is tht robotic science cannot reawaken the country's interest in space; allegedly, that can only be done by astronauts. With regard to the first, it is important to remember what scientists thought of the Apollo program when it existed. They detested it. They criticized it for the same reasons the shuttle is criticized today: it consumed funds that should have been spent on space science, and its claims of being a scientific program were unjustified.

"This neglected bit of history is recounted in 'Beyond the Atmosphere: The early Years of Space Science', by Homer E. Newell, who was associate administrator of NASA until his retirement in 1973. Newell reminds us that Philip Abelson, editor of 'Science' magazine, thundered at the Apollo program, arguing that it was not worth the effort and expense and that much more could be achieved at far less cost with unmanned spacecraft. At one point Abelson polled some 200 scientists o the question and reported their overwhelming agreement with his viewpoint. Newell also recalls the criticisms of Eugene Shoemaker, a member of the U.S. Geological Survey who spent years on the Apollo project developing instruments for lunar exploration and training astronauts in field geology. But before Apollo ended, Shoemaker excoriated the program for its inattention to the needs and interests of science and for wasting opportunities to accomplish more lunar science than it did. These criticism and those of other scientists finally resulted in the inclusion of a geologist, Harrison Schmitt, on the last Apollo flight.

"Murray's second assumption -- that only human involvement can interest Americans in further explorations of Mars -- is also questionable. The cost alone of sending humans would surely cool the enthusiasm opf many citizens and congressmen who thought they favored the venture. In contrast, an advanced robotic mission would cost one or two percent as much. Further, the new technology in robotics and artificial intelligence that would be generated by such a mission would be useful for mcountless tasks at home, so the mission would help pay for itself. One of the arguments advanced by Murray and others who favor sending men to Mars is that man has explored every place within his reach -- Earth, Earth orbit, the moon -- and now it is time to go to Mars. This whimsy has become a central tenet of the new Martian dream. The truth is, however, that much of our own planet -- the bottom of the seas -- is still unexplored by man. It has always been too difficult a place for humans. Now it can be done robotically. Manned exploration of the unknown world was necessary in the 15th century, because there was no other way to do it. But in our time the only reaon to send humans on voyages for which robots are better suited is to entertain the television audience.

"The American public has repeatedly shown its interest in the question of life on Mars and the look of faraway places. Most recently that interest was demonstrated in the popular resposne to the adventures of Voyager 2. It is also seen in the eager public anticipation of the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope. Given such evidence, is it unreasonable to suppose that Americans may decide they prefer robotic missions to Mars for the foreseeable future? Anything is possible, once they have reflected on the costs of a manned mission in dollars and in lives. (Judging from our Apollo and Shuttle experiences, a loss of life is probable.) Of course the public must be told why scientists think Mars is an interesting place to study: What can we learn from Mars that we cannot learn at home? Why does it seem possible that life existed on Mars in the past, and how do we propose to search for evidence of it? Why are robots, controlled by artificial intelligence (and ultimately by humans on Earth), better suited than astronauts for pursuing these questions? Let us hope that the nation will not have to waste many billions of dollars and a crew or two before it changes the direction in which it is currently headed."

You don't have to completely follow Horowitz' belief that robots will ALWAYS be better at exploring worlds beyond the Moon than humans are to agree with his main argument. The switchover to robotic exploration of the deep sea has not "ended that era of exploration"; it has tremendously accelerated it. Unless we can come up with concrete reasons to pump gargantuan amounts of money into manned deep space expeditions in the near future -- and we can't -- their only possible purpose, as Horowitz said, is as public entertainment. And the public is consistently telling the pollsters that they aren't willing to spend more than a total of "a few billion dollars" of their tax money for manned lunar and Mars expeditions -- which is to say that they don't think they're worth doing at all for entertainment value. But they MIGHT be willing to spend that same "few billion dollars" on really interesting unmanned space exploration, in which case it actually WOULD get some results.

[dvandorn]

Very, very good reply, Bruce. Thank you -- this is more the kind of spirited discourse this subject needs.

Now, for a few counter-points and expressions of appreciation...

At some point, of course, new techonologies WILL make it worthwhile to send humans into space, just as new technology eventually made it worthwhile to return to the South Pole. If we do it before then, we will simply be seriously slowing down the progress of human exploration as a whole -- something the FY 2007 NASA budget makes excruciatingly clear.

I'm very glad to hear that first statement. I actually think we're more in agreement than not, overall, Bruce -- I don't think it's necessary for us to be spending billions on manned lunar or Martian operations within the next 20 years, when we're on the verge of making some significant breakthroughs in so many areas that will make it *far* faster and easier to get around the solar system than it is now. For instance, I think we're going to be hearing a lot more about Franklin Chiang-Diaz's plasma drive in the near future.

However -- and here we part company, I think -- I *truly* believe that we have to stay in the manned spaceflight business in order to be able to take advantage of these new technologies as they come on line.

I am convinced that developing a CEV that can be used as a multi-purpose crew delivery system to both present and future mission-dedicated spacecraft is a good idea, a good investment, a necessary maintenance of American manned spaceflight capability, and a justified use of NASA's resources.

I personally think that Shuttle ops should be limited to completing the ISS and performing one last Hubble servicing flight. The NASA planners are saying that will require 29 more flights. I assume they know better than I do how much it will require... though I have to say, I think it could be done in less. And the current (dare I say cowardly?) reluctance of NASA to fly a vehicle that is safer than any version of it they have ever flown before, drawing good money after bad without getting *any* result out of it, is the basis of yet another discussion... *sigh*...

The failure of NASA to be able to maintain any kind of consistent funding levels for a well-planned unmanned exploration program is not, in my opinion, simply a case of the manned program "eating" the unmanned program. What we are seeing is a political failure, not an administrative failure. For good and solid administrative *and* political reasons, the manned and unmanned spaceflight directorates were set up separately 'way back when in the '50s, precisely so that funding pressures from a potentially floundering manned program would not result in the rape of the unmanned exploration programs. The political failure took place gradually, over the course of both Democratic and Republican administrations, but the multi-center, separate-accounting days of NASA have been over for some time now. And with a single administrative steering committee responsible for *all* NASA programs, and responsible for the "sharing of the pie" all 'round the town, we have now been put in the position where political pressure to "make us some space heroes" has become responsible for cutbacks in unquestionably worthwhile programs.

As with any political failure, it can be reversed, over time. The concept of presenting to Congress separate funding requests from different NASA centers, each with its own set of justifications, can be brought back. I mean, there are constituencies within almost every other federal agency -- we *can* get it back to where the unmanned and manned constituencies are able to argue their own cases and be dealt with as separate entities, pursuing related but separate goals.

That, IMHO, is the only reasonable course to try and navigate -- get JPL and APL and Huntsville and Houston out there, pitching their own programs and getting their own separate budgets. Such a process would raise the level of discourse, and result in a better-educated set of lawmakers.

You don't have to completely follow Horowitz' belief that robots will ALWAYS be better at exploring worlds beyond the Moon than humans are to agree with his main argument. The switchover to robotic exploration of the deep sea has not "ended that era of exploration"; it has tremendously accelerated it. Unless we can come up with concrete reasons to pump gargantuan amounts of money into manned deep space expeditions in the near future -- and we can't -- their only possible purpose, as Horowitz said, is as public entertainment. And the public is consistently telling the pollsters that they aren't willing to spend more than a total of "a few billion dollars" of their tax money for manned lunar and Mars expeditions -- which is to say that they don't think they're worth doing at all for entertainment value. But they MIGHT be willing to spend that same "few billion dollars" on really interesting unmanned space exploration, in which case it actually WOULD get some results.

Yes, a lot of deep-sea investigation is being done by robots. But, even though robots can do the job far more safely and effectively, and can get into so many small nooks and crannies, why do people spend millions of dollars to arrange their own manned dives down to the wreck of the Titanic?

In that case, just sending our senses there isn't enough. As a people, as a culture, we have to *keep* sending people down to that wreck. Even though it costs a fairly ridiculous amount of money to do so, and is a somewhat risky thing to do. And even though such continued visits are destroying the wreckage.

Even though we don't have to.

But, as near as I can tell, solely because we can.

As for those pesky polls -- you know what they say: there are lies, damned lies, and statistics. If you look more closely at those same polls, those same people believe that NASA's budget is larger than that of the Department of Health and Human Services, that it amounts to well more than $100 billion a year, and that they believe that somehow all that money ends up getting shot into space, and not spent on salaries, resources, support and maintenance, etc., etc., etc....

Give me a poll of informed Americans, and I'll take it a little more seriously.

-the other Doug