Michael Mealling has some thoughtful analysis of the issues the new

presidential commission is tackling (and links to other commentary and
the first public hearing) at rocketforge:

http://www.rocketforge.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid9

Is the problem, as Neil Tyson describes, exactly that we're treating
what we do next in space as a single immense project (a modern
"cathedral", which is certainly the pattern for Apollo, Shuttle, Space
Station) when in fact what we want is many small projects, some of which
may fail on their own, but overall working together to bring humans
outward into space?

Reading "CIO" magazine the other day, this description of commercial
product development struck me:

"more than 60 percent of all new-product development efforts are
scuttled before they ever reach the market. Of the 40 percent that do
see the light of day, 40 percent fail to become profitable and are
[quickly] withdrawn [...] Three-quarters of the money spent in product
development investments results in products that [fail]".

Silicon Valley saw some of the greatest innovations of recent decades,
in a culture that saw no stigma in failure. Failure is ok - it's to be
expected! If you're not failing roughly 3/4 of the time, you're not
innovating enough! Our problem in space seems to be that we invest so
much in huge single projects that we can't afford to let them "fail".
Failure should be an option. In fact we have learned a lot from the
failures in our robotic missions, and they are widely acknowledged as a
big NASA bright spot. Hubble started out as a failure too.

Of course we don't want to recklessly kill people; designs should
include how to get people safely out of the various possible failure
conditions. But designing systems to eliminate the chance of failure
precludes innovation, and that's much worse.

As Michael suggests: "Figure out how to make the aerospace industry look
like the computer and Internet industries and we'll have large
populations living on Mars in our lifetimes."

Arthur Smith

Greetings Arthur,

"Of course we don't want to recklessly kill people;
designs should include how to get people safely out of
the various possible failure conditions."

I assert you cannot have it both ways of fast
innovation and human space travel. Put a single life
at stake and failure is not an option or you are being
by definition reckless. Safety precautions that drive
up cost enormously while making managers and planners
very cautious. Who wants to explain to an astronauts
family why a minor oversight cost them their loved
ones life.

The NASA programs of the 1960's were right in line
with the growth of exotic materials that were needed
for space travel as well as industry. This meant lots
of spin offs and proven technologies to the companies
that applied them. They only risked their
implementation which is a lot less than the
development and proving of something completely new.

It is my impression that the current growth is in the
sophistication of automation and the replacement of
human tasks with remotely controlled robots. It has
taken hold in all types of manufacturing. Now it is
set to assist garbage collection, mining, deep sea oil
drilling, etc.

If you buy a gameset from Microsoft or Nintendo, you
will see robots cavorting across the screen. Life
imitates art and eventually people will figure out how
to make better more powerful robots and control them
from a standard interface. This has not happened yet
and is the opportunity for 50 teams to compete and
produce a superior technology.

My conclusion is that ultra lean robotic missions to
build facilities on the moon is the fastest most
direct and assured way to getting away from the
Cathedral project mindset you describe. This is
because it has direct potential in all of the key
areas that have fostered the space movement namely
science, the military, and industry yet does not have
the consolidating forces that the risk of lives
encourages.

- Thor

Michael Mealling has some thoughtful analysis of the
issues the new presidential commission is tackling
(and links to other commentary and
the first public hearing) at rocketforge:

http://www.rocketforge.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid9

Is the problem, as Neil Tyson describes, exactly that
we're treating what we do next in space as a single
immense project (a modern "cathedral", which is
certainly the pattern for Apollo, Shuttle, Space
Station) when in fact what we want is many small
projects, some of which may fail on their own, but
overall working together to bring humans outward into
space?

Reading "CIO" magazine the other day, this description
of commercial product development struck me:

"more than 60 percent of all new-product development
efforts are scuttled before they ever reach the
market. Of the 40 percent that do
see the light of day, 40 percent fail to become
profitable and are [quickly] withdrawn [...]
Three-quarters of the money spent in product
development investments results in products that
[fail]".

Silicon Valley saw some of the greatest innovations of
recent decades, in a culture that saw no stigma in
failure. Failure is ok - it's to be
expected! If you're not failing roughly 3/4 of the
time, you're not innovating enough! Our problem in
space seems to be that we invest so much in huge
single projects that we can't afford to let them
"fail".

Failure should be an option. In fact we have learned a
lot from the failures in our robotic missions, and
they are widely acknowledged as a big NASA bright
spot. Hubble started out as a failure too.

Of course we don't want to recklessly kill people;
designs should include how to get people safely out of
the various possible failure conditions. But designing
systems to eliminate the chance of failure
precludes innovation, and that's much worse.

As Michael suggests: "Figure out how to make the
aerospace industry look like the computer and Internet
industries and we'll have large
populations living on Mars in our lifetimes."

Arthur Smith

> Greetings Arthur,
>
> "Of course we don't want to recklessly kill people;
> designs should include how to get people safely out of
> the various possible failure conditions."
>
> I assert you cannot have it both ways of fast
> innovation and human space travel. Put a single life
> at stake and failure is not an option or you are being
> by definition reckless. Safety precautions that drive
> up cost enormously while making managers and planners
> very cautious.

Soyuz is the counter-example. Fails often, but hasn't killed
any astronauts in decades.

Arthur

[...]
> I assert you cannot have it both ways of fast
> innovation and human space travel. Put a single life
> at stake and failure is not an option or you are being
> by definition reckless. Safety precautions that drive
> up cost enormously while making managers and planners
> very cautious. Who wants to explain to an astronauts
> family why a minor oversight cost them their loved
> ones life.

We take risks all the time. Understanding and managing risk is part of
all exploration and development. It is not reckless to take measured
risks. The reason NASA has cost problems is not simply risk aversion,
it's risk aversion coupled with a love of needless complexity.
Simplify things and risks go down. The shuttle accidents (both of
them) could have been avoided by simplifying the launcher. Ditch the
wings, ditch the solids, ditch the requirement to lift payload and crew
in one vehicle, and you have a system that can be made both more robust
and more likely to keep the crew alive in the event of a system failure.

Technological risk management is well understood by nearly everyone
except NASA. That's a little unfair, since there are numerous people
within NASA who understand how to manage risks, just not the ones
making system level decisions.

......Andrew

Yes, developing space technology in Russia would be
cheaper. Are you proposing that NASA should use
Russian subcontractors to lower the cost?

- Thor

> Greetings Arthur,
>
> I assert you cannot have it both ways of fast
> innovation and human space travel. Put a single
> life at stake and failure is not an option or you
> are being by definition reckless. Safety
> precautions that drive up cost enormously
> while making managers and planners
> very cautious.

Soyuz is the counter-example. Fails often, but hasn't
killed any astronauts in decades.

Arthur

No, Russian methods. Failure is an option, and planned for.

Arthur

Hmm... It sure looks like you have an entrenched
"American" culture at NASA. Good luck trying to teach
them to think like Russians.

While failure is indeed part of the process, it cannot
subsitute for the goal of a movement. NASA is glued
together by a higher purpose than sheparding a series
of unrelated projects. There is a central purpose in
making the resources of space available. Divide its
attention and resources and you will weaken this even
if it seems the fasted way to your goal.

- Thor

> Soyuz is the counter-example. Fails often, but hasn't
> killed any astronauts in decades.
>
> Arthur

Fails often?

The Soyuz launch vehicle's successful flight a couple weeks ago was
number 1685! (Of course, this counts related LVs with the same core.)
In the last 8 years, there has been only one failure.

Soyuz LV launch log (7/96 to present)
http://www.starsem.com/soyuz/log.htm

The Soyuz spacecraft has flown more than 230 times, with very few
critical failures (Soyuz 1, Soyuz 11 - almost 35 years ago). On all
levels (critical failures, major and minor in-flight anomalies, etc.)
it has done better than all US spacecraft, especially considering the
much smaller number of flights for the U.S. Mercury, Gemini, and
Apollo. And have you ever seen the binders that document all the
Shuttle in-flight anomolies? Most of the Soyuz systems are robust
enough that problems (like mistargeted landings) do not lead to
critical failures.

Soyuz spacecraft family
http://www.astronautix.com/craftfam/soyuz.htm
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/soyz7kok.htm

I think you have to say the Soyuz launch vehicle and spacecraft is
the most successful piloted space system ever built.

One lesson from Russia: "The 'better' is the enemy of the 'good'."

In other words, if you have a working system, you get low cost
routine operations by keeping the same basic design, and making
incremental improvements. New systems can be developed, but they have
to be brought into operation and demonstrate success before you
retire old systems. The American habit of starting with a blank sheet
of paper each time mystifies the Russians.

This philosophy works well on something like launch vehicles, where
you want low cost and reliable operation. You can still take risks
and test new technologies on space experiments. (Like the Russian
solar sail test, or the Gemini tether test.) Just don't bet
*everything* you have on each part of a new system working perfect
the first time. The successful 'full-up' test of the Saturn V
(called 'Apollo 4', Nov. 1967) was *very* lucky.

- Eric Dahlstrom

>> Soyuz is the counter-example. Fails often, but hasn't
>> killed any astronauts in decades.
>>
>> Arthur
>
> Fails often?
>
> [...]

> Most of the Soyuz systems are robust
> enough that problems (like mistargeted landings) do not lead to
> critical failures.

Ok, sorry, I guess I should have said "has problems often", which
Shuttle does too. Good points. By the way, I liked the quotes from you
in Klerkx' book - have you read it yet? :-)

Arthur

I have a mixed feelings about Russian methods.

First off, its great for rockets. Russia has
succeeded in large parts in their rocketry because
they find something they like and stick to it. The
proton is as close as you get to a massproduced
rocket. The reason this was able to happen in russia
comes down to the molniya orbit that their satellites
must fly to cover a country so far to the north.
Because of this, the lifetime of thir comm sats are
greatly reduced as compared with a geo commsat used in
america, therefor must be replaced much more
frequently.

Second, russia has a problem with exploration
satellites. They have never, to this day, had a
successful Mars mission (in fairness, they had success
at Venus). This consistant failure rate to me implies
a problem in the process within the russian satellite
sector. Here in the US, we have a very rigorous
testing methodology. Yes, this testing causes our
costs to balloon up, but it makes our failure rate
alot lower. If anything else, Faster, Better, Cheaper
showed what happens when we try to cut corners in the
testing process.

So I would say that when it comes to exploration
satellites, the "American" engineer culture is
superior to that of the Russian. For this reason, ESA
itself modeled alot of its cultural practices after
NASA not Russia.

good book on this is another great light-reading book
I finished a few months ago called "Launching Europe"
by Stacia Zabusky, ISBN # 0691029725. Its an
ethnographic look at the culture of ESA.

For a good look at "American", aka NASA, culture, I
highly recommend "Inside Nasa: High Technology and
Organizational Change in the U.S. Space Program" by
Howard McCurdy, ISBN: 0801849756)

Ryan Z

> Here in the US, we have a very rigorous
> testing methodology. Yes, this testing causes our
> costs to balloon up, but it makes our failure rate
> alot lower. If anything else, Faster, Better, Cheaper
> showed what happens when we try to cut corners in the
> testing process.

Some of the FBC missions worked though (Pathfinder). Was there a net
increase in bang per buck? Maybe not. But a lot more different things
were tried... Mars Observer was not FBC and it was lost too.

But I guess I mostly agree with you, which was actually sort of where I
started from - on robotics we seem to have it about right, partly I
think because no robotic mission goes much over $1 billion in cost, so
they "can afford to fail". Anything much more costly is "too big to
fail", costs balloon, there are no visible milestones to keep the
public interest, and we have another Shuttle or ISS.

Arthur

> Greetings Arthur,
>
> "Of course we don't want to recklessly kill people;
> designs should include how to get people safely out of
> the various possible failure conditions."
>
> I assert you cannot have it both ways of fast
> innovation and human space travel. Put a single life
> at stake and failure is not an option or you are being
> by definition reckless. Safety precautions that drive
> up cost enormously while making managers and planners
> very cautious. Who wants to explain to an astronauts
> family why a minor oversight cost them their loved
> ones life.

The same standards are not applied to airplane, automobile,
motorcycle or even bicycle travel. That standard was not applied to
the colonization of the American West, or to the original migration
from Kenya. It is understood that failures will happen. And even
the hyperengineered shuttles have had two catastrophic failures and
hundreds if not thousands of minor failures, threatening and non-.

To proceed beyond the NASA mindset of the past thirty years, one
must accept that PEOPLE WILL DIE colonizing space. They will die of
all sorts of grisly and in some cases excruciating and drawn out
deaths.

Think of the risk you take every time you get in a car or ride a
bicycle, of the statistics of fatalities by these types of
transportation. These are all areas where a minor oversight can
cost a loved ones' life. And yet, we accept these risks, because
the benefits are so great. It will be the same with space.

Ed

>
> To proceed beyond the NASA mindset of the past thirty years, one
> must accept that PEOPLE WILL DIE colonizing space. They will die of
> all sorts of grisly and in some cases excruciating and drawn out
> deaths.

As long as the people involved fully understand the risks, this simply
should not be an issue. There's no reason space exploration should be
held to a higher standard than vulcanology, deep sea fishing, or oil
exploration. The problem arises when astronauts are both explorers and
PR representatives. That's one reason I dislike the "inspire youth"
justification for the space program - not only is it redundant (a truly
dynamic space program will be inspiring without any need for a PR
office), but it also places astronauts in the spotlight, where it's bad
PR to get them killed.

Nobody wants needless deaths, but there are plenty of people willing to
accept substantial risks in order to be part of opening the high
frontier. I know I'd be willing to accept considerable risk in order
to be a hands-on participant in opening the high frontier, and I don't
doubt that many others on this list feel that way too.

Burt Rutan (in his typically blunt way) recently said that the problem
with NASA is that they aren't killing enough astronauts. His point was
that pushing the envelope involves risk, and if you do it enough,
sooner or later someone's number is going to come up. It's not
callous, it's just reality.

......Andrew

Softly, softly, catchee monkey...

In the case of Vulcanology, the cost of the mission
costs less than $10,000 to virtually any spot on the
globe. Like Everest if people want to spend their
money and take the risk there is little reason to stop
them. I sure am not going to admire them or sponsor
them to do so.

In the case of Deap Sea fishing and Oil exploration,
these are established natural resource industries with
years of experience. People are well paid to take
dangerous job and the society as a whole cannot do
without either oil or food.

None of these examples is like the tax payer funded
enterprise of human space travel. Aside from war we
don't fund people to risk their lives needlessly and
it looks mighty embarrassing when a crew dies.

Is it a safe conclusion then that private funding is
required to allow astronauts to have a higher risk of
dying? NASA doesn't have such a great track record -
that isn't for trying though.

- Thor

On Saturday, February 14, 2004, at 03:49 PM, Ed
>
> To proceed beyond the NASA mindset of the past
>thirty years, one must accept that PEOPLE WILL DIE
>colonizing space. They will die of all sorts of
>grisly and in some cases excruciating and drawn out
>deaths.

As long as the people involved fully understand the
risks, this simply should not be an issue. There's no
reason space exploration should be
held to a higher standard than vulcanology, deep sea
fishing, or oil exploration. The problem arises when
astronauts are both explorers and PR representatives.
That's one reason I dislike the "inspire youth"
justification for the space program - not only is it
redundant (a truly
dynamic space program will be inspiring without any
need for a PR office), but it also places astronauts
in the spotlight, where it's bad
PR to get them killed.

Nobody wants needless deaths, but there are plenty of
people willing to accept substantial risks in order to
be part of opening the high
frontier. I know I'd be willing to accept
considerable risk in order to be a hands-on
participant in opening the high frontier, and I don't
doubt that many others on this list feel that way too.

Burt Rutan (in his typically blunt way) recently said
that the problem with NASA is that they aren't killing
enough astronauts. His point was
that pushing the envelope involves risk, and if you do
it enough, sooner or later someone's number is going
to come up. It's not callous, it's just reality.

......Andrew

Softly, softly, catchee monkey...