Archivo etiqueta «Exploración espacial»
Par Robert Zubrin, ingénieur en astronautique et président de la Mars Society. Traduction: Pierre Brisson, président de la Mars Society Switzerland (LE TEMPS, 17/02/10):
Le 2 février 2010, l’administration Obama a annoncé une nouvelle politique spatiale. Elle comporte trois décisions essentielles: le subventionnement par la NASA du développement de systèmes privés pour acheminer les astronautes jusqu’à la Station spatiale internationale; l’annulation du programme Constellation consacré au développement des équipements nécessaires aux vols habités vers la Lune; l’abandon du concept de fixation d’objectif de mission pour les vols habités, au profit d’une approche basée sur le financement d’une recherche technologique ayant pour… Seguir leyendo
By James Cameron, the writer and director of “Avatar“and “Titanic” and the NASA Advisory Council from 2003 to 2005 (THE WASHINGTON POST, 05/02/10):
What do rockets burn for fuel? Money. Money that is contributed by working families who have mortgages and children who need braces. And why do the American people support our efforts in space? Because they still believe, to some extent or another, in that shining dream of exploring other worlds. So it could be said that rockets really run on dreams.
The exploration of space is the grandest adventure challenging the human race. As a filmmaker I… Seguir leyendo
By Mark Henderson, science editor (THE TIMES, 02/02/10):
Our planet has just enjoyed a weekend of rare company. The “wolf Moon”, as it is known to native Americans, has hung huge and full at its nearest point to Earth. Mars, meanwhile, has made its closest approach in six years, its red glow almost as bright as any star. Yet at this moment of tantalising proximity to our celestial neighbours, Barack Obama stands accused of pushing them farther away.
The Nasa budget that he presented yesterday cancels the new rockets that might return astronauts to the Moon and the plans for… Seguir leyendo
Por Jean-Jacques Dordain y Maurici Lucena. Son, respectivamente, director general y presidente del Consejo de la Agencia Espacial Europea (EL PAÍS, 30/12/09):
Hace 40 años, el hombre pisó por primera vez la Luna. Cuarenta años después, las dos grandes potencias que compitieron ferozmente por alcanzar la Luna cooperan todos los días a bordo de la Estación Espacial Internacional. En la actualidad, una tripulación de seis astronautas de distintas nacionalidades vive y trabaja de forma permanente en un inmenso laboratorio, del tamaño de un estadio de fútbol, que orbita 250 kilómetros por encima de nuestras cabezas fruto de la colaboración entre… Seguir leyendo
By Edward Lu, a former astronaut and the program manager for advanced projects at Google (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 21/12/09):
In Silicon Valley we have a saying: launch early, launch often. It’s an acknowledgment that successful, innovative companies are the ones that rapidly try new ideas, see what works, improve their products and repeat. Businesses that launch frequently are also able to take advantage of economies of scale to make launchings faster and easier. In many ways, the key to innovation is speed of execution.
NASA, an agency that depends on innovation, could benefit from the same mindset. To meet… Seguir leyendo
By William S. Marshall, a staff scientist with the Universities Space Research Association based at the NASA Ames Research Center (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 20/11/09):
Picture a habitat atop a hill in warm sunlight on the edge of a crater near the south pole of the Moon. There are metal ores in the rocks nearby and ice in the shadows of the crater below. Solar arrays are set up on the regolith that covers the Moon’s surface. Humans live in sealed, cave-like lava tubes, protected from solar flares and sustained by large surface greenhouses. Imagine the Moon as the first… Seguir leyendo
By Lawrence M. Krauss, the director of the Origins Initiative at Arizona State University and the author of The Physics of Star Trek (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 01/09/09):
Now that the hype surrounding the 40th anniversary of the Moon landings has come and gone, we are faced with the grim reality that if we want to send humans back to the Moon the investment is likely to run in excess of $150 billion. The cost to get to Mars could easily be two to four times that, if it is possible at all.
This is the issue being wrestled with… Seguir leyendo
Por José Manuel Sánchez Ron, miembro de la Real Academia Española y catedrático de Historia de la Ciencia en la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (EL PAÍS, 18/08/09):
Pertenezco a un grupo -creo que bastante numeroso- cada vez más decepcionado con la política nacional. Ofende a la inteligencia, a la capacidad de razonamiento lógico que caracteriza a los humanos, contemplar como una buena parte de los políticos españoles se sumergen en campañas electorales como la que tuvo lugar hace poco para elegir a nuestros representantes en el Parlamento Europeo y no hablan para nada de política europea, empleando la mayor parte… Seguir leyendo
By Gerald M. Smith, who worked at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the California Institute of Technology from 1962 to 1997. He received the Distinguished Service Medal from NASA in 1996 (THE WASHINGTON POST, 15/08/09):
The public meetings and media reports about the Human Space Flight Plans Committee, a 10-member advisory panel appointed at the request of President Obama, indicate that NASA’s mission is about to change. It needs to.
For the past five decades, NASA has concentrated on exploration of our solar system. It has done a marvelous job. We have tremendous knowledge about virtually all the nearby planets… Seguir leyendo
By Martin Rees. Lord Rees of Ludlow is the Astronomer Royal (THE TIMES, 22/07/09):
Until the 1950s space travel was a futuristic concept, familiar from H. G. Wells and Jules Verne — and from comics and cornflake packets. But Sputnik, followed by Yuri Gagarin’s (and John Glenn’s) circling of the Earth made it real. The advent of the space age crystallised into reality human fantasies that dated back centuries.
The Moon landings came less than 70 years after the first powered flight — Orville Wright’s “brief hop” at Kitty Hawk — and only 12 years after the launch of Sputnik.… Seguir leyendo
Quarante ans après Armstrong, l’Europe doit affirmer son ambition spatiale. Par Louis Gallois, président exécutif d’EADS (LE MONDE, 21/07/09):
Il y a quarante ans, le 20 juillet 1969, Neil Armstrong posait le pied sur la Lune. Ce “petit pas” portait les fruits d’une vision grandiose. A peine huit ans plus tôt, le président Kennedy déclarait au Congrès sa conviction : “Ce n’est pas un seul homme qui ira sur la Lune, c’est le pays tout entier. Car chacun d’entre nous doit se mobiliser pour l’y envoyer.”
A l’époque, l’Europe était peu active dans le domaine spatial. La situation a radicalement… Seguir leyendo
Por Fernando Sánchez Dragó, escritor y columnista de EL MUNDO (EL MUNDO, 20/07/09):
No es lo mismo ir a la Luna que estar en ella. Lo segundo alude a quienes creen en lo primero. ¿Cuarenta años ya? No me toquen las pelotas. Yo tenía treinta y dos y estaba como un queso de mozzarella de búfala. ¿Quién iba a imaginarse que ocho lustros después, podrido por la gusanera de la ancianidad, lo sería de cabrales?
De búfala, decía, porque el paripé del alunizaje me pilló en Italia. Roma era entonces una fiesta. ¿Tanto como el París de Hemingway? ¡Hombre, no… Seguir leyendo
Por Charles Krauthammer, politólogo, economista y columnista de The Washington Post (EL MUNDO, 20/07/09):
Michael Crichton escribió en una ocasión que si le hubiera dicho a un médico de 1869 que en cuestión de 100 años el hombre viajaría a la Luna, y después perdería el interés por el satélite, el facultativo le habría declarado de inmediato «demente». En el año 2000, yo cité esta misma anécdota expresando la incredulidad de Crichton ante la dejadez de EEUU con la Luna. Pues bien, ya es 2009 y ésta despierta aún menos interés.
Hoy se cumple el 40º aniversario del primer aterrizaje… Seguir leyendo
By Tom Wolfe, the author of The Right Stuff, an account of the Mercury Seven astronauts (THE NEW YORK TIMES, 19/07/09):
Well, let’s see now … That was a small step for Neil Armstrong, a giant leap for mankind and a real knee in the groin for NASA.
The American space program, the greatest, grandest, most Promethean — O.K. if I add “godlike”? — quest in the history of the world, died in infancy at 10:56 p.m. New York time on July 20, 1969, the moment the foot of Apollo 11’s Commander Armstrong touched the surface of the Moon.
It… Seguir leyendo
By Kevin Fong, co-director of the Centre for Altitude, Space and Extreme environment medicine (THE GUARDIAN, 17/07/09):
How did we allow “vision” and “inspiration” to become dirty words when discussing science? Why are these regarded as fluffy concepts that have no place in the modern world of scientific research? The science journal Nature has carried out an online, international, cross-disciplinary survey of scientists who have published in their journal in the last three years. Of the 800 or so respondents, more than half cite Project Apollo as having directly influenced them to become a scientist. I was stunned. This is… Seguir leyendo