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The Lunar X Prize: Greed is Good

post #1 of 18
9/13/07 at 4:40pm
Thread Starter 
From that conservative mouthpiece The New York Times:

The group whose $10 million prize spurred privately funded rocketeers to send a small piloted craft to the cusp of space in 2004 has issued a new challenge: an unmanned moon shot.

The “Google Lunar X Prize” was announced today in Los Angeles at Wired Magazine’s NextFest conference. The contest calls for entrants to land a rover on the moon that will be able to travel at least 500 meters and send high-resolution video, still images and other data back home.
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What a heartening development. Finally, we as a society are coming to understand that profit will drive space travel.

Now, if we can just find something valuable enough on the Moon, or another body in the Solar System, to make it worth the trip ...
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post #2 of 18
9/13/07 at 4:52pm
Whatever it takes to keep us exploring space.
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post #3 of 18
9/13/07 at 4:56pm
I always find these competitions pretty fascinating. I'm looking forward to the DARPA Grand Challenge. Driverless cars that can maneuver through traffic sound pretty cool to me, but I guess I'm just a nerd.

I have a suspicion that this competition will be consist mostly of rich guys rather than academics like the Grand Challenge. They are probably more motivated by a fascination with space and bragging rights as opposed to the cash prize.
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post #4 of 18
9/13/07 at 4:59pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jacob Singer
Whatever it takes to keep us exploring space.
Lord knows that I'll probably be alive in 2071. I want to know if we got to that Cowboy Bebop universe or not.
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post #5 of 18
9/13/07 at 5:28pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by englebert
I have a suspicion that this competition will be consist mostly of rich guys rather than academics like the Grand Challenge. They are probably more motivated by a fascination with space and bragging rights as opposed to the cash prize.
That's ok. A rich guy is bringing us Virgin Galactic.
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post #6 of 18
9/13/07 at 5:46pm
I really have no problem with space exploration being motivated by profit. Or the free market in general. I have a problem with the good of corporations being placed above the good of people, which so far this doesn't do. If we ever get into The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress territory, then I'll take up arms.
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post #7 of 18
9/13/07 at 8:38pm
Giving away prizes is artificial motivation.

Quote:
Now, if we can just find something valuable enough on the Moon, or another body in the Solar System, to make it worth the trip ...
Exactly. There's profit in mining asteroids, to give one example, but even if the project's started tomorrow that profit won't be realized in the next quarter, or the next. Space exploration is guaranteed to be a long-term investment, and corporations aren't interested in waiting that long for a return. They need artificial motivation.

Might as well just subcontract the R&D needed to do . . . whatever (solar power satellites, major interferometry arrays in strategic orbits, telescopes on the back side of the moon) and create motivation that way. Money spent flinging a high resolution camera at the moon is money poorly spent on doing something we already know how to do.

Some people think space exploration is valuable even if shareholders don't make a profit doing it, by the way.
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post #8 of 18
9/13/07 at 8:43pm
The profile of Richard Branson in the New Yorker a few months back had him basically saying the same thing: innovation is eventually profitable, so why shouldn't we be encouraging private companies to explore space travel? There are downsides, sure, but I think we can all agree that our future lies in the stars, and -- honestly -- I don't think we'll see Planet Starbucks in our lifetimes.
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post #9 of 18
9/13/07 at 9:14pm
Quote:
innovation is eventually profitable, so why shouldn't we be encouraging private companies to explore space travel?
Because private companies think short term and solely in terms of ROI, that's why. Space exploration is definitely not short-term, and what's the ROI in determining the average energy density in the COBE or looking for planets around Pulsars?

If someone can make money doing this stuff, good for them. But these things are worthwhile even if no one makes money doing them. Leave it to private industry, and worthwhile things won't get done because doing them won't raise the stock price fast enough. To my mind, that's not much of a reason at all.
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post #10 of 18
9/13/07 at 9:42pm
It sure worked out for the native people of the Americas.

I'm completely for space exploration, but would hate to see our culture commit another unforgivable genocide in the name of profit and manifest destiny.
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post #11 of 18
9/13/07 at 9:48pm
I really don't know why we don't have HD cameras sitting on the moon so that humans can watch the Earth "rising" over the moon from home.

Well... we probably do, but nobody is sharing.
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post #12 of 18
9/13/07 at 10:37pm
All I know is that I want a summer home on the moon or Mars.
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post #13 of 18
9/13/07 at 10:57pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by yt
It sure worked out for the native people of the Americas.

I'm completely for space exploration, but would hate to see our culture commit another unforgivable genocide in the name of profit and manifest destiny.
Right, because Mars and Jupiter are full of aliens with their own distinct culture. Obviously the encountering of extraterrestrial life is an issue that needs to be kept in mind, and that should be discussed, but even if space travel were to suddenly have the exponential advancement that, say, the computer industry had, I think it would be at least several generations before we were able to send people to planets that may have extraterrestrial life. It's a good point, but I think it's a theoretical one as well -- like I said, I don't think I'll be seeing mass colonization of even the outer solar system in my lifetime.

Seabass, I guess what I was trying to say is that there's a balance to be struck -- there can be room for private space exploration as well as government funded experiments like the one you described. And based on some of the things I've read, the idea of a "science officer" on board doesn't seem too far off.
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post #14 of 18
9/14/07 at 12:22am
I really don't see a lot of room. Not yet. I'm not saying private industry shouldn't be allowed to pursue space travel, I'm saying there's nothing in it for them. If 3M can figure out a way to make vast amounts of cash moving asteroids around and mining them for their metals that's great. Can you see them pouring billions into R&D for projects that won't pay off for decades, if at all? I can't.

If money is the issue, there's plenty of money to be made designing and building these experiments and facilities, the vehicles to get there, the support systems, the tracking systems, etc. Ask any defense company. Most of them are in on the gig already in any case.

And this applies to small businesses as well. I work for a company of maybe 30 people, and I'm surprised at the amount of product we ship to NASA as well as observatories that for the sake of my NDA I shall only say Frank Cobretti's probably intimately familiar with.
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post #15 of 18
9/14/07 at 10:19am
Thread Starter 
I see the exploration of space unfolding much like the European exploration of the rest of the world.

For the foreseeable future, major space projects will be government-led, as nobody else has the interest or resources to do the basic science and corporations don't really care about prestige projects like putting people on Mars.

Eventually, however, somebody's going to figure out how to get rich in space, just as the English figured out tea, tobacco, and sugar; the Spanish figured out gold; and the Portuguese figured out teak. Once that happens, the race is on and we're on our way.
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post #16 of 18
9/14/07 at 11:34am
Someone should spread the rumor that melted Pluto ice will make you immortal.
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post #17 of 18
9/14/07 at 1:36pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by Alan "Nordling" Cerny
Someone should spread the rumor that melted Pluto ice will make you immortal.


Too late.
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post #18 of 18
9/15/07 at 2:59am
There's SPACE-TEAK out there, corporations! Go for it!
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