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NASA Slashing Observations of Earth
Posted by
kdawson
on Tue Jan 16, 2007 11:20 PM
from the blue-marble dept.
from the blue-marble dept.
mattnyc99 points us to a new report by the National Research Council warning that, by 2010, the number of NASA's Earth-observing missions will drop dramatically, and the number of operating sensors and instruments on NASA spacecraft will decrease by 40 percent. The report says, "The United States' extraordinary foundation of global observations is at great risk." Popular Mechanics asks an MIT professor what it all means. From these accounts it is clear that the Bush administration's priorities on a Mars mission and a moon base are partly to blame for the de-emphasizing of earth science. Neither article quite says that some responsibility must fall to the administration's footdragging on global warming.
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I wonder... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I would rather have other countries show us how it's done rather than tell us how it should be done, but it seems rather unlikely. If they try and fail, they can get laughed at, but if they tell us to try and we fail, they can laugh at us.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Insightful)
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
1) Clinton signed Kyoto. [whereistand.com]
2) The worst offendors are first world countries (like US, the worst polluter & Australia, the worst per-capita polluter)
3) India/China are not projected to reach the US's level of greenhouse gas contribution for 20 years. Per Capita equivilance is even further away.
4) Kyoto wasn't supposed to be a solution - it was supposed to be a first step. Anyone thinking otherwise is deluded.
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Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Interesting)
It looks like for the most part, countries only signed where it was convenient and easy to do (SHOCKING!!! GOVERNMENTS ACTING IN THEIR OWN SELF INTEREST????), and now even a lot of European countries are missing quota.
So in reality, it looks like no one was really serious about climate change, just looking out for themselves. It kind of puts the United States actions in perspective. Why should we shoulder the massive financial burden of "saving the world" while India and China destroy our manufacturing sector since they will be a haven for corporations who want to manufacture without stringent regulations for CO2 emissions.
Like I said in my previous post, the only way global warming will be addressed is if there is some sort of global government. And that is why global warming will never be addressed. It's sad to say, but there is no way to convince most countries to do anything (unless the UN decided to impose economic/military actions on polluters, and even then, military action would require the United States to dfront all the money/personnnel for the military force)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I think it'd be more accurate to say there's no way to convince most countries to do things that are against their own self-interest. That's simply logic at work - why agree to do something you think will be a net harm to your nation? The challenge is in persuading the numerous countries of the world to agree that A) something is indeed a problem for them, and B) a given solution will be effective and fair.
Item A is hard enough.
Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Insightful)
The point is, Kyoto was a *start of a long process, which America has successfully sabotaged, mostly because the US government hasn't got the balls to try and persuade it's country to stop running SUVs and the like. With America, we'd probably have some kind of working process and maybe, like with CFCs, some sort of handle on the problem. Without America, we cannot persuade nations like China or India to start reining it on it's pollution.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
"Clinton was right in refusing to sign Kyoto" !? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:I wonder... (Score:4, Informative)
1) global climate change
2) global trade
and you're wrong, too:
"the worst offenders get a free pass"
The USA and Australia _are_ the worst offenders, and neither are signing Kyoto.
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Re:I wonder... (Score:4, Informative)
Of course, you can't lose an economic advantage just because you might SAVE THE FUCKING WORLD. Next quarter's stock prices are the only measure of the right thing to do.
And you're in a much better position to pressure China and India to sign on if you're already in compliance. Meanwhile, the US is still far and away the world's greatest producer of greenhouse gases. Not to mention the fact that much Chinsse industry is produced to order for US customers.
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The Nero generation (Score:5, Informative)
The way I see it, by refusing to sign "the worst offenders" have given themselves a "free pass" at the expense of everyone else.
First up, Kyoto was never intended to be a silver bullet, it has a use by date of 2012 and was intended to get everyone on board and "level the playing field". As a prototype GHG treaty it was eventually accepted by virtually all nations, the only two dissenters (that still matter) are Australia and the US.
Second, although China may surpass the US one day, (either in total or per capita output), currently the US consumes 25% of global fossil fuels and has 3% of global population and where I live (Australia) has a similar per capita ratio.
Third, the developed world is "developed" due largely to the advantage we have gained over the 20th centry by burning FF's and in doing so we have used up a large chunk of the climates finite ability to "cope" with the extra CO2 (by "cope" I mean provide a habitat able to support humans and thier civilizations indefinitely).
Fourth, China, India, ect, have not burnt FF's in large amounts until recently and understandably demand some form of compensation in any "first cut" treaty to account for the capacity the developed world has already used (ie: in their eyes, "leveling the playing field").
Fifth, The claims of the US & Oz governments that they "will meet their Kyoto obligations anyway" is creative accounting at best, but I prefer to call it a lie.
AGW is a global problem that urgently requires a global treaty, in much the same way as atmospheric N-tests did in the 60's & 70's (BTW: the scientists had a rough time back then also, eg: Marsden from CSIRO who found plutonium spread throughout the atmosphere). I don't pretend to have the political answers but we won't get an answer until all parties come to the table in good faith, since that is unlikely we are probably doomed to be remembered as the Nero generation, that is if there is anyone left to remember.
I wouldn't mind this (myopic/insightfull?) "ruin the economy" meme as much had the US & Oz used economic models that were anywhere near the strength of the much maligned climate models, instead they used classic Friedman models and the associated basic assumptions that resources are infinite and pollution is sombody else's problem.
Take a close look at this "coventional" wisdom (well "conventional" to >3% of mankind) that Kyoto would "ruin the economy", what it really boils down to is: "it would ruining the fossil fuel market". I can only assume it will do this in much the same way as the ozone treaty ruined the CFC market, lead controls have ruined the paint and gasoline markets, and the atmospheric N-Test ban ruined the US military.
Global treaties to ensure global corporations and nation states at least attempt to preserve "the commons" is not some half-arsed socialist plot, it's plain common sense not to shit in ones own nest.
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Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Informative)
On July 25, 1997, before the Kyoto Protocol was finalized (although it had been fully negotiated, and a penultimate draft was finished), the U.S. Senate unanimously passed by a 95-0 vote the Byrd-Hagel Resolution (S. Res. 98),[40] which stated the sense of the Senate was that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol that did not include binding targets and timetables for developing as well as industrialized nations or "would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States". On November 12, 1998, Vice President Al Gore symbolically signed the protocol. Both Gore and Senator Joseph Lieberman indicated that the protocol would not be acted upon in the Senate until there was participation by the developing nations.[41] The Clinton Administration never submitted the protocol to the Senate for ratification.
So Al Gore signed it as a gesture while stating he wouldnt act on it, and Congress voted unanimously to reject it (in possibly the first and last time Dems and Repubs ever agreed on anything). Its OK, you can still hate Bush for other shit.
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Re:I wonder... (Score:5, Informative)
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Most time there is any serious scientific conference on the matter, it seems that the concern is getting larger and larger. Most climatologists believe that anthropogenic global warming is a huge threat to society and which needs to be acted on urgently. All evidence seems to be pointing clearly in one direction.
There have been a few changes in regional climate patterns in t
The Global Warming Conspiracy... (Score:4, Funny)
Someone should whisper in the Bush Administration's ear (located in the rear underneath the belt) that the Iranians are behind global warming. That should get funding for the earth sciences in the right direction.
nice troll, smitty (Score:4, Insightful)
Can we mark a submission, as -1, Unnecessary Trolling?
Re: nice troll, smitty (Score:2, Insightful)
> Can we mark a submission, as -1, Unnecessary Trolling?
Unfortunately, it's hard for reasonable people to avoid considering the proposition.
This is the administration that forbade the tour guides at the Grand Canyon from mentioning how old is is, lest they offend creationists.
Personally I think the Moon/Mars mission decision was an attempt to construct a legacy. But like I said,
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Bandwagon posts are just annoying (Score:5, Informative)
Here's something for ya: Empirical evidence. You know, we have a good record of atmospheric composition and temperatures for the past 50-60-70 years.
Somebody tested various models on historical data. You know where you started, you know what happened, and you know the outcome.
Good enough for you?
They tried it [bbc.co.uk]. More here [ucsd.edu].
But, feel free to post any good rebuttals on this study if you indeed know more than I do.
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Perfect (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Perfect (Score:5, Funny)
Exxon is launching Lobbysat II and Bogusat III to prove that there is no global warming. They shaved costs by not including any sensors nor cameras.
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Slashdot tipping over (Score:4, Insightful)
Not to mention troll bait (but just the fact that certain words ARE troll bait should tell you something) but global warming is just one of them. why is this a Michael Crichton (the Harvard-educated scientist who wrote Coma, Jurassic Park and A State Of Fear, among other things) vs Al Gore (inventor of the Internet) battle? If we're scientists, where is our skepticism? For that matter, where are our manners? Are we unwilling to admit that we might be incorrect?
(..Wait, I forgot. Sorry. Please don't revoke my geek card.)
What I really don't understand is why all the surprisingly non-geek-oriented but heavily political stories are appearing on Slashdot.org. Anyway, back to finishing my TPS reports..
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Re:Slashdot tipping over (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Slashdot tipping over (Score:4, Insightful)
This should be hilarious. The total sum of Al Gore's formal education consists in getting a Bachelor of Arts degree in government from Harvard (and not completing a law degree at Vanderbilt). Al Gore is even less qualified to talk about climate science than Michael Crichton (who at least has had formal training in experimental analysis while getting a medical degree at Harvard).
Neither of them has a degree in the physical sciences and nothing they say should be taken as knowledge interpreted by a scientist. I don't care how far you want to twist it, a MD and a BA in government do not make you even remotely qualified to discuss climate change. Why the world has focused on these unqualified 'spokesmen' to be cheerleaders for their differing sides of the global warming debate is beyond me.
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Gore isn't posing as an expert like Crichton is (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Slashdot tipping over (Score:5, Insightful)
And Michael Crichton's books, though they sell well, are not scientifically valid. That is pretty well-known. Medical Doctors, even Harvard MDs, are not automatic authorities on every scientific subject on the planet. Crichton is not a climatologist, and I'm fairly sure you were aware of that seemingly obvious fact. Would you take your local proctologist's word about quantum mechanics? Is your dermatologist a reliable authority on string theory?
When it comes to climatology, you might want to look at what the climatologists have been saying--and they've been saying for decades that humans are contributing significantly to global warming. Are you saying that all the climatologists are wrong about climatology, but Michael Crichton, Harvard M.D., really set the record straight in his fictional novel?
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Worship Credentials Much? (Score:3, Insightful)
There was a time that people we're allowed to spout out ideas that the Church opposed, and only the Church could approve ideas, and only the Church chose who was in the Church. This period of time is generally considered to have been bad for human advancement a
Re:Slashdot tipping over (Score:5, Insightful)
If you want the same answer for all time, stick with religion. Science is a process by which we learn about the world around us. Science's best answer 30+ years ago was different than it is now, because now they have more data, better models, better computers, etc. It's also called "learning," meaning that your knowledge changes. A system that doesn't learn and improve isn't very useful. If you're going to distrust the best answer science has because they might revise it sometime in the future, turn off your computer, turn off all the lights in your house, and never take medicine again. Don't drive a car or use chemically sanitized water or food.
Scientific analysis is always provisional, but that provisional, groping, slow, fallible process gave you all of those things, and you damned sure shouldn't trust them. Only religion gives certitudes. If you don't trust science, then don't trust the fruits of science. By their fruits shall ye know them, and all of that.
From where I'm standing, science seems dependable, and really the only somewhat reliable, if ultimately fallible, system we have for finding out about the world. I know the response is usually "we should do absolutely nothing until we know absolutely everything," but there is a point past which skepticism is just arrogance and bullheadedness. The preponderance of the evidence is too overwhelming to reject, and the price is too high to ignore.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Sadly, yes, science has been wrong in the past. It will no doubt be wrong again. It's a human endeavor, limited by the nature of our perception, instruments, data, mortality, intelligence, and so on. Good luck living without medication, electricity, airplanes, sanitation, and all those other things that this undependable, ideology-laden worldview has saddled us with. If o
Re:Slashdot tipping over (Score:5, Insightful)
How strange. Seems the opposite to me.
Every story that mentions India, for instance, evinces a swarm of racist and jingoistic posts, many modded "insightful". Every article mentioning the word "evolution" gets hundreds of posts advocating creationism. Every article mentioning guns draws a bunch of gun rights advocates.
Perhaps the anonymous poster means there's more criticism of GW Bush. Well, there's more to criticise. Regardless of your political leanings, the one thing that unites most commentators is that GWB has royally fucked up everything he's touched.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
o advocate individual responsibility for individual actions
o support government limited to its Constitutional powers
o take a positive view of legal firearms ownership
o want a strong national defense
o insist on the rule of law
and many other points of view which have generally been considered conservative.
It's the meaning of the word "conservative" that has drifted.
>What I really don't understand is why all the surprisingly non-geek-oriented but heavily pol
Perhaps its too obvious to make sense... (Score:2)
Sure, sure, sure, I know they will use it to monitor US citizens, but it could also be used to monitor the globe.
When you buy a new car, you don't buy spare tires at the same time?
Observing Earth (Score:2, Funny)
NY Times @ Slashdot (Score:3, Insightful)
Must editorial opinions mark every bit of tech news here on Slashdot? Maybe Andrew Rosenthal should be granted an editorial position here at
Slashdoublespeak (Score:5, Informative)
Second, the NASA budget is essentially fixed. There are 4 directorates within NASA:
- Aeronautics (conventional aircraft-related research)
- Science (satellites and probes)
- Space Operations (funding to maintain shuttle and station)
- Exploration
- COTS (Funding commercial space to provide space transportation capability (non-exploratory)
- Constellation (Ares/Orion/LSAM - the vehicles that will both replace shuttle as well as comprise the lunar architecture)
The problem is that over the next couple years, the Exploration budget starts ramping up as the development costs begin to really add up in advance of a 2014 first (crewed) flight. Meanwhile, until the shuttle is retired in 2010, the SOMD budget must remain relatively constant since the cost of operating the shuttle fleet doesn't dip until its retirement. So what are your choices?If you ask me - the obvious solution is:
D) Increase NASA funding to maintain all of the above until Ares/Orion enters an operations phase.
Keep in mind - the NASA budget is about half of one percent of the federal budget...
Note: you can mock the lunar outpost and Mars missions all you want - but those costs aren't even in the budget yet (and won't be for some 10 years or more) and are not driving this "problem" despite the misleading claims in the article.
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Slashdot Parents Ends with Flamebait (Score:3, Insightful)
Inappropriate ideological sniping. That is a stated opinion on a highly disputed theory among experts in the field, not science.
Its clear? (Score:4, Insightful)
"From these accounts it is clear that the Bush administration's priorities on a Mars mission and a moon base are partly to blame for the de-emphasizing of earth science. Neither article quite says that some responsibility must fall to the administration's footdragging on global warming."
A quick glance reveals that one article never mentions Bush by name, the other only in that they are calling for more emphasis on global warming research and that real scientists (not /. scientist wannabes) are happy they really are funding the Mars missions.
What is this, really? The New York Times (not exactly known to have a major conservative slant) doesn't bash Bush so instead the /. article has to insert in a completely unsupported accusation?
Re:no wonder (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you ever tried to buy an acquisition from DigitalGlobe? Do you have $10,000? If you have more questions, read the NRC report itself:
http://books.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11820
or read about NASA's current Earth science research:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/ [nasa.gov]
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re:A huge waste of taxpayers money? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't think handing that money over to Congress will lead to anything tangible for you or I.
Second, think about the peripheral benefits of everything NASA has done, not just the pretty pictures. Subtract the Voyager probes. The science section at Barnes and Noble is a whole lot thinner ehh? How many books have been published, how many scientists have been educated, how many television shows have been produced based on what those two probes discovered? Suddenly, we know virtually nothing about the moons of Saturn and I don't get to wonder if there is life under the seas of Europa.
Subtract some rocket science that was pioneered by NASA and the Soviets during the space race. Perhaps your cell phone can't call Australia anymore, hurricanes give us less warning and HBO does not have quite as many options. I doubt private industry would be quite so far along in communication satellite technology were it not for the feasibility of such demonstrated by NASA.
Subtract some planetary and atmospheric science regarding Venus. The Global Warming theory suddenly has holes in it's foundation and we couldn't have half the arguments we do on Slashdot.
Subtract Hubble. Suddenly the official stance of the Vatican's is that we are at the center of the universe, we have a few million less interesting web pages and my desire to learn more and educate myself regarding astronomy are greatly diminished.
Despite NASA's budget being slashed and despite their priorities being subject to the whims of politicians, they've done quite well in educating and inspiring all of us who care to pay attention.
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Re:A huge waste of taxpayers money? (Score:5, Informative)
Maybe defense at 537 billion.
How about Health and human services at 687 billion? There is oodles of waste there.
Here is a breakdown of the US budget taken from the treasury departments website http://www.fms.treas.gov/mts/index.html [treas.gov]
Budget Outlays
Legislative Branch 4,463
Judicial Branch 6,382
Department of Agriculture 88,296
Department of Commerce 6,673
Department of Defense-Military 537,308
Department of Education 66,623
Department of Energy 21,583
Department of Health and Human Services 687,946
Department of Homeland Security 49,302
Department of Housing and Urban Development 45,891
Department of the Interior 9,952
Department of Justice 24,643
Department of Labor 50,218
Department of State 15,225
Department of Transportation 65,928
Department of the Treasury:
Interest on Treasury debt securities (gross) 440,627
Other 58,626
Department of Veterans Affairs 74,032
Corps of Engineers 7,758
Other Defense Civil Programs 47,540
Environmental Protection Agency 7,875
Executive Office of the President 3,644
General Services Administration 881
International Assistance Program 17,246
National Aeronautics and Space Administration 16,350
National Science Foundation 5,837
Office of Personnel Management 67,428
Small Business Administration 1,433
Social Security Administration 621,979
Other independent agencies 22,295
That is a total of 3 trillion, which gives NASA a wopping 0.5% of the US budget. During Apollo, it was at 6%. That is quite a difference.
NASA still does amazing work, but its kind of hard to make everything work when Congress will not give them the budget they were told to plan to. Something gets cut when they don't get money they were supposed to.
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How many sensors DO you need for THAT? (Score:5, Insightful)
So it seems to me that to keep plotting that you don't even need one single space mission. You just need to take the temperatures from all those meteorology stations all over the world, take an average, plot it. How can the big oil stop you from doing that? No, seriously. I'm curious. And even if you need data from meteo satellites, why do you need NASA there? By now there are enough sensors up there to forecast the weather, which starts by telling you exactly what is happening with the weather right now. (Forecasting then just feeds that into a model and tries to predict what will happen tomorrow.) How can the big oil stop you from using data from those?
I'm sure there must be some other science data that we're going to miss, maybe even for modelling the atmospheric phenomena, maybe even something that might help understand better _how_ that global warming is or isn't happening. But stop you from collecting the evidence? How would they possibly do that, anyway? Shoot every single meteorologist on Earth, or what? Bear in mind that that doesn't only include the mouthpieces presenting the weather forecast on TV. The Air Force in every country, for example, is extremely interested in the weather too, because their air missions depend on it. Plus a lot of other commercial and government stuff. Even if you shot all meteorologists, the air force and governments and everyone else will just train more, because they really need that data.
That's what annoys me about conspiracy theories, including the trolling in the submission: they propose that the big bad conspiracy is doing something impossible, pointless and stupid to even try.
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Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Great idea, just explain to me how you get the temperature at 8km height without a satellite? Or 30km? This is important information for understanding what is happening.
> You just need to take the temperatures from all those meteorology stations all over the world, take an average, plot it.
No. Part of the question is the attribution to a reason, which current consensus puts on greenhouse gases.
> And even if you ne
You are behind the times. (Score:5, Insightful)
The really critical questions relate to the mechanics of climate change. Questions about the magnitude and nature of human contributions to climate change vs natural factors. Having even marginally better answers to these questions is of immense public value, because they bear on policy questions with massive economic impact. For example, changing our use of fossil fuel even slightly would probably cost far more than the sum total of these missions. It follows that it would be good to know what precise impact of a marginal unit of change in petroleum use would be. It may be the optimal change would be zero (there is no chance of affecting anything), or it may be that we should reduce our use of petroleum considerably, until the net economic impact of slowed climate change equals the net cost of fossil fuel reduction.
In order to address these policy questions, we need climate models. The climate models are useful to the degree they are appropriately calibrated and tested. The most economical way to do that is with your space program.
Derek Bok once said, "If you think education is expensive, you should try ignorance." Environmental research is educating ourselves on how the planet works. Thus, if you think monitoring the Earth is expensive, you will find that not monitoring the Earth is much, much more expensive. Suppose the truth is that the Earth is getting dramatically warmer, but there is nothing we can do about it. As sea levels rise, inundating lower lying areas, as breadbasket regions become arid, as Europe starts to become very cold, there will be politically impossible not to do something about it. The conclusion the populace will draw is that the change is purely anthropogenic, and whether or not that is true there will be irresistable pressure to lock the barn door after the horse has escaped. Thus we will compound the tremendous impact of climate change with futile but very costly effort to fix the problem.
No -- more knowledge is better than less. In this case, it is hard to think of a better bargain than a tiny fraction of the GDP spent on remote sensing missions.
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