Legislation permitting private space flight stalled in washington

Some people are ready to begin the privatization and, thus, ultimate colonization of space.... but the legislation that would allow private space travel is stalled:

www.msnbc.msn.com...

I was SOOO hoping to see the X-Prize resolved soon... God knows that groups like Scaled Composites and XCor have done a lot of work.

One would hope that a nation, and culture, based on having a frontier would be open to having a new one...

Imagine explorers of the old west in the U.S. having to get permission from the government everytime they went exploring!

You would have to be very rich to actually travel to space though. All the wealthy would be first on the bandwagon, while the poor would never have the means to.

I do wonder who will win the X-prize though.

Originally posted by Sterling46
You would have to be very rich to actually travel to space though. All the wealthy would be first on the bandwagon, while the poor would never have the means to.

I do wonder who will win the X-prize though.

Ahhhh..... so let the rich be the guinea pigs. When they crash and burn enough and the bugs are all worked out, maybe then those without such wealth could afford to go!

Originally posted by Sterling46
You would have to be very rich to actually travel to space though. All the wealthy would be first on the bandwagon, while the poor would never have the means to.

I do wonder who will win the X-prize though.

Same was said of many things before this. Automobiles, Flight, but in the end the only way to ever truly make a return on your investment in most any industry, is by being able to replicate your goods or services in a manner that puts them in reach of general consumption. It's just the evolution of business really.


No doubt it'll take some time before it happens, but it eventually has to happen.


TS

no problem the world is bigger than usa
and there is enough ground in the new
European states so it can be an economic
benifit for them.

You can not compare the rich fettish with automobiles that caused them to finally be produceable for more regular people, with space flight.

Space flight is dangerous, and if it were common place it'd be even more dangerous, no billionaire (which is needed to invest in space flight) is going to invest in it for private reasons because no billionaire wants to explode and the only glory in space is too far for private hands to reach.

Only NASA can achieve glory so people will bother doing it.

In Europe before Ford made the autos cheap, they were still raced by rich people who thought it was a fancy and fun thing to do, and when you crashed it was only a scuffle.

If they could ONLY race at 300 mph they'd never have done it, they are rich, they have lands, they have much to lose.

The idea of private space flight is moronic anyways, you still need control like "flight control" and that makes it beyond the capabilities of private entities.

Here's my question OIMD...why the hell does there have to be legislation approving this? I slept through the part where we lost our inherent right to exploration and discovery and went to a society where we had to wait for the government okie-dokie before we could continue our endeavors as a technologically-progressing society.

Next time pinch me so I don't miss these things.

What a load of horse-hockey!

You don't have the right to do anything that can blatantly result in another person's death, this includes maintaining dangerous explosives, chemicals, or doing stupid things that end up getting someone killed with the latter you're charged with "wrongful death".

Flying Rockets into space sounds all good and fun until one mis-fires into a house 300 miles away blowing up a family.

You seem to think I mean that "Joe Sixpack" will be jumping into space all by himself. That's not at all what I meant. I mean that while yes, at first rich will be the ones who go on "space cruises" etc, the prices will give way, as they have to in order for companies that are doing all this work to make a full return and start gaining profit. Which is what it's all about.

Don't take my statement out of context, this isn't an episoid of "Star Trek" and persons will not be jetting into space all by their lonesome. But the analogies stated are the same, just on a different scale. The rich are always the earily adopters of "luxury technology" but it always comes down to making it available to "Joe Sixpack". That's the goal of almost any business, to bring their product to the masses, where they get the most money possible.

It will not only be the rich "early adopters" that will stabalize the industry, and make the technology more available to the public. You'll eventually have corporations scrambling to get up and out there for mining purposes, zero g research, construction etc. They too will be part of the picture of stabalizing the entire industry and privitization of space.

This is not such a big step in the grand scheme of things really. It's more like the next "little hop". It will be the natural progression, like many industries before it.

TS

Well there isn't a line 1,000 miles long of billionaires and multi-millionaires wanting to take a ride on the Soyuz, so why would they want to privatize space at all?

I think that is where your argument or wishes are flawed, there is no great interest in such privatization and so there will be no great political motivation.

Well sir,

The entire focus of the legislation we are discussing in this particular thread, was for privately funded technologies that are set to be much more cost effective and accessable than the elitist trips that have taken place thus far. The whole premise behind the x prize is for the focus that I've alluded to in my previous responses. But I digress...


You are certainly just as entitled to your opinion as I am mine. And I respect yours. I guess we'll just have to wait and see. You say wishes, I say insight. While neither of us can be proven correct here, I'd like to think that we will both think back on these thoughts, and discussions, to reflect on the changes we see in 25 to 30 years, whatever that may be.


Regards,

TS