Is the Brookings Institution – which is primarily an economic security study concern – responsible for the excruciatingly slow scientific progress of space exploration 50 years after Sputnik I?
By: Ringo Bones
In the 20th Century it took us only 44 -or so- years from the first airplane flight to an airplane flying faster than the speed of sound. Why can’t our existing space programs progress just as fast? Ever since that National Geographic documentary about space exploration in which a Brookings Institution report was published. This report advising NASA against reporting findings on the existence of extraterrestrial life to the general public, every coffee shop and internet café in the Far East are now a buzz about the Brookings Institution’s true purpose. But first, here’s a primer on that said institution.
The Brookings Institution is a non- profit public policy “think tank” based in Washington, DC. As the United States of America’s oldest “think tank”, Brookings is devoted (primarily?) to public service through research and education in the social sciences, particularly in economics, government and foreign policy. The Brookings Institution’s stated principal purpose is “to aid in the development of sound public policies and to promote public understanding of issues of national (i.e. the US of A ‘s) importance. Brookings was founded in 1916, when a group of “reformers” (or is that government officials of limited legislative powers dissatisfied with the incumbent administration) founded the Institute for Government Research (IGR), the first private organization in the US devoted to analyzing public policy issues at a national level. The Institutions founder, philanthropist Robert S. Brookings (1850-1952), originally financed the formation of three organizations: The Institute for Government Research, The Institute of Economics, and the Robert Brookings Graduate School. The three were merged into the Brookings Institution in 1927. The Brookings Institute is currently headed by Strobe Talbott a former Clinton administration appointee in the US State Department.
The “mystique” surrounding the Brookings Institution began in 1958 when the United States Congress created the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) under the new Space Act to replace its 1915 predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics or NACA. Throughout the 1960’s, under US Government behest, NASA adopted a very unusual non-disclosure policy that prohibited their management from releasing information concerning the discovery of sentient extraterrestrial life capable of space travel. The policy was created and fashioned after the Brookings Institution report entitled “Peaceful Uses of Outer Space”. In that report, the Brookings Institution recommended prohibition of disclosure with a warning against the revelation of the existence of extraterrestrial life to the people of America and the world. Brookings Institution thinkers feared (vicariously?) social, economic, and religious upeaval could result. Many now believe that the Brookings Institution’s conclusions were based on the now famous events, which transpired in October 30, 1938, the public reaction to Orson Welles’s radio broadcast of “The War of the Worlds” and the local panic that ensued.
In the 21st Century, humanity’s level of sophistication has surely rose “a few notches” since that 1938 radio broadcast. To me, it’s quite “difficult to understand” how a futuristic agency tasked with the goal of space exploration -like NASA – can be handicapped by a fear, which originated before most of us were born. Are civilian astronauts / “space tourist” immune to the US Government’s “behest” to keep quiet about “ET”? Maybe this is why none of the billionaires are setting up their own space programs in frenzy.
Does extraterrestrial life exist, is the moon landing “staged’? To end the speculation, civilians should be allowed free access to space despite of the dangers and fiscal costs. Sometimes I wonder after all this time there is no photo of the Apollo 11 landing site taken by a space probe –preferably commissioned by a non- US Government entity (Will China or India suffice) - orbiting 100 kilometers above the moon.
In my opinion, it seems like the people in charge of the Brookings Institute were still living in an “Aristotelian Mindset” when they fashioned their “Peaceful Uses of Outer Space” report. It’s a pity that the great literary giants in Europe during the late 15th Century onwards didn’t write “science fiction” the way Gene Roddenberry makes conjectures about “alien civilizations”. I mean, if only William Shakespeare wrote a “story” about how to properly interact with the native peoples of the “New World”, the native people’s interaction with the European Colonizers would surely be more equitable.
In Brookings Institutions defense, they are seldom –if ever – taken seriously by the various US administrations that came and went since the end of World War II. Brookings even made it into then President Richard Nixon’s famous “enemies lists”. Brookings even warned the US Government back in 2000 that if the proper financial reforms aren’t done, a credit crunch – as what is currently happening –can occur.
Basing on the existing facts about the case, the Brookings Institution cannot be held wholly responsible for arresting the development of space travel because they merely work in an advisory capacity. Their “Space” policy may be found wanting but at least some of their ideas keep “minor wars” from getting out of hand while Wall Street goes about like its business as usual.
One very weird fact about the Brookings Institute that I’ve just learned recently is that they were never mentioned – in passing – on Chris Carter’s X-Files TV series. One of my Internet acquaintances tried to Google the two, but the search results points to the X-Files episode where FBI agents Mulder and Schully were assigned to investigate the allegedly supernatural incidents in a gated community called Arcadia.
Showing posts with label Space Exploration. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Space Exploration. Show all posts
Friday, October 5, 2007
Friday, August 10, 2007
Astronauts: NASA’s Weakest Link?
Conventional wisdom states that a system is only as strong as its weakest link. Does this mean that NASA’s greatest asset - human space explorers i.e. astronauts -are also their greatest liability?
By: Vanessa Uy
Ever since NASA astronaut Lisa Nowak’s adult diaper-aided crime-of-passion / escapade became headline news, things have not been going well for NASA’s manned space exploration program. Then came the allegations of the drunkenness of shuttle astronauts slated for current missions – the “bottle to throttle” fiasco. And the most disturbing of all: the pre-flight sabotage of the vibration monitoring / detecting computer that’s slated to be installed in the International Space Station (ISS) which seems like the proverbial “last straw” that NASA won’t be able to recover. Despite a live news conference last 27th of July 2007 that aired on both BBC and CNN about the administrative action that would be taken by NASA to investigate these allegations and the establishment of a “Performance Integrity Criterion” that will be followed rigorously by the astronauts. Despite of the recent successful launch of the Space Shuttle Endeavor, is NASA’s reputation already tarnished beyond repair?
At the cost of almost a billion dollars per launch, the American taxpayer has every right to be mindful about the professionalism and integrity of their astronauts for a lot of reasons other that the “astronomical” cost of running the best manned space exploration program on the planet. Ever since the 1980’s, there are scientific experiments -whose benefits even includes a cure for cancer- can only be performed in the weightless conditions i.e. in space. So Americans held their astronauts with high regard like some “latter day messiah.” To me, the pre-flight sabotage of the vibration-monitoring computer is the most disturbing of all the “irregularities” that has surfaced in recent investigations. If this is true – and the “tampering” incident had been going on since NASA first started the series of “microgravity environment” experiments back in the 1980’s – then the data obtained during this experiments should be taken with a “grain of salt.” That’s billions of dollars and countless man-hours of drudgery wasted, in other words - one giant “step back” for mankind.
Recently, the “Blog-o-sphere” is abuzz with opinions/suggestions that since NASA launches more unmanned missions like the latest PHOENIX Mars robotic space probe, the administrative body should fire all of their astronauts. To me, the problem with this logic is that at present –or even in the foreseeable future- we still don’t know how to build “robots” that are smart and self-aware enough to replace our “human space explorers.” The “human versus robot” debate extends even to the nurse / caregiver camp, but this is a topic for future discussion.
There exists a “Kultur Kampf” between the two main schools of thought weather it would be ever possible that we humans can ever construct a “robot” that is self-aware and as smart as us. On one camp, Alan Turing – the Great Grandfather of our modern computer technology- believes that by the middle of the 21st Century advancements in computer technology would allow us to design and construct “computers/robots” that are self-aware and as smart as or even smarter than us. Alan Turing even designed a test named after him - the Turing Test - as an evaluation tool to see if a “computer system” has the ability for self-awareness and human like intelligence. Turing “dreamed-up” the concept back in the 1940’s by the way. In the other camp is Roger Penrose – one of the greatest living theoretical physicist today- who theorized that electronic computers can never replicate the process of the human mind that give rise to self-awareness and intelligence. To put it in overly simplistic terms, a skilled blacksmith can create a very beautiful sword but that same sword can never create a blacksmith – even a mediocre one. Sadly, I’m subscribing to Roger Penrose’s view because it’s backed up by my own day –to- day “empirical evidence.” Though the last time I heard from Roger Penrose, he was very optimistic about “quantum computers.” Even if we are fortunate enough to have developed human-like robots -10 years from now- capable of replacing NASA’s astronauts, when was the last time a space probe / robotic spacecraft had a ticker tape parade down Madison Avenue after returning from a successful mission? Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein produced “cartoons” doesn’t count by the way.
Like it or not, humans are way better designed than “robots” when it comes to tackling the unexpected nature of space exploration. The American Taxpayer and the global community of space exploration enthusiasts will just have to live with the “frailties” of our very human astronauts like tendencies to “blow out some steam” once in a while. And there is the ever- present potential to resort to “substance abuse” in an otherwise stress-filled occupation. Despite all of this, there’s one thing we humans have that won’t probably be replicated by our “faux-sentient cybernetic creations” – for centuries to come – is our ability to better ourselves. This is the raison d’être of drug rehab and alcohol treatment centers that guarantees the job security so-to-speak of their counselors and psychotherapists. And I just can’t help but re-emphasize our ability to better ourselves. As proof of this, one of the latest astronauts on the Space Shuttle Endeavor – Barbara Morgan – has transformed herself through training from a “mere” schoolteacher to a full-fledged astronaut. She had done this because current NASA policy doesn’t allow “civilians” to ride in the space shuttle since the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster over twenty years ago.
And let’s not forget that our global overpopulation problem has no other “viable” solution in the foreseeable future other than space colonization. The sooner we develop our space exploration programs into a viable space colonization endeavor the better off humanity could progress without destroying the fragile ecosystem of our planet.
By: Vanessa Uy
Ever since NASA astronaut Lisa Nowak’s adult diaper-aided crime-of-passion / escapade became headline news, things have not been going well for NASA’s manned space exploration program. Then came the allegations of the drunkenness of shuttle astronauts slated for current missions – the “bottle to throttle” fiasco. And the most disturbing of all: the pre-flight sabotage of the vibration monitoring / detecting computer that’s slated to be installed in the International Space Station (ISS) which seems like the proverbial “last straw” that NASA won’t be able to recover. Despite a live news conference last 27th of July 2007 that aired on both BBC and CNN about the administrative action that would be taken by NASA to investigate these allegations and the establishment of a “Performance Integrity Criterion” that will be followed rigorously by the astronauts. Despite of the recent successful launch of the Space Shuttle Endeavor, is NASA’s reputation already tarnished beyond repair?
At the cost of almost a billion dollars per launch, the American taxpayer has every right to be mindful about the professionalism and integrity of their astronauts for a lot of reasons other that the “astronomical” cost of running the best manned space exploration program on the planet. Ever since the 1980’s, there are scientific experiments -whose benefits even includes a cure for cancer- can only be performed in the weightless conditions i.e. in space. So Americans held their astronauts with high regard like some “latter day messiah.” To me, the pre-flight sabotage of the vibration-monitoring computer is the most disturbing of all the “irregularities” that has surfaced in recent investigations. If this is true – and the “tampering” incident had been going on since NASA first started the series of “microgravity environment” experiments back in the 1980’s – then the data obtained during this experiments should be taken with a “grain of salt.” That’s billions of dollars and countless man-hours of drudgery wasted, in other words - one giant “step back” for mankind.
Recently, the “Blog-o-sphere” is abuzz with opinions/suggestions that since NASA launches more unmanned missions like the latest PHOENIX Mars robotic space probe, the administrative body should fire all of their astronauts. To me, the problem with this logic is that at present –or even in the foreseeable future- we still don’t know how to build “robots” that are smart and self-aware enough to replace our “human space explorers.” The “human versus robot” debate extends even to the nurse / caregiver camp, but this is a topic for future discussion.
There exists a “Kultur Kampf” between the two main schools of thought weather it would be ever possible that we humans can ever construct a “robot” that is self-aware and as smart as us. On one camp, Alan Turing – the Great Grandfather of our modern computer technology- believes that by the middle of the 21st Century advancements in computer technology would allow us to design and construct “computers/robots” that are self-aware and as smart as or even smarter than us. Alan Turing even designed a test named after him - the Turing Test - as an evaluation tool to see if a “computer system” has the ability for self-awareness and human like intelligence. Turing “dreamed-up” the concept back in the 1940’s by the way. In the other camp is Roger Penrose – one of the greatest living theoretical physicist today- who theorized that electronic computers can never replicate the process of the human mind that give rise to self-awareness and intelligence. To put it in overly simplistic terms, a skilled blacksmith can create a very beautiful sword but that same sword can never create a blacksmith – even a mediocre one. Sadly, I’m subscribing to Roger Penrose’s view because it’s backed up by my own day –to- day “empirical evidence.” Though the last time I heard from Roger Penrose, he was very optimistic about “quantum computers.” Even if we are fortunate enough to have developed human-like robots -10 years from now- capable of replacing NASA’s astronauts, when was the last time a space probe / robotic spacecraft had a ticker tape parade down Madison Avenue after returning from a successful mission? Bill Oakley and Josh Weinstein produced “cartoons” doesn’t count by the way.
Like it or not, humans are way better designed than “robots” when it comes to tackling the unexpected nature of space exploration. The American Taxpayer and the global community of space exploration enthusiasts will just have to live with the “frailties” of our very human astronauts like tendencies to “blow out some steam” once in a while. And there is the ever- present potential to resort to “substance abuse” in an otherwise stress-filled occupation. Despite all of this, there’s one thing we humans have that won’t probably be replicated by our “faux-sentient cybernetic creations” – for centuries to come – is our ability to better ourselves. This is the raison d’être of drug rehab and alcohol treatment centers that guarantees the job security so-to-speak of their counselors and psychotherapists. And I just can’t help but re-emphasize our ability to better ourselves. As proof of this, one of the latest astronauts on the Space Shuttle Endeavor – Barbara Morgan – has transformed herself through training from a “mere” schoolteacher to a full-fledged astronaut. She had done this because current NASA policy doesn’t allow “civilians” to ride in the space shuttle since the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster over twenty years ago.
And let’s not forget that our global overpopulation problem has no other “viable” solution in the foreseeable future other than space colonization. The sooner we develop our space exploration programs into a viable space colonization endeavor the better off humanity could progress without destroying the fragile ecosystem of our planet.
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