Quote from Lotesdelere :

http://www.panoramas.dk/mars/greeley-haven.html

Watching that I am constantly bombarded with the mind-blowing thought that that's a whole other f*cking planet

God I love space.


Come on NASA, get that high-gain antenna up, we want PICTURES DAMMIT.

It's in trouble, apparently it needs to connect to the iTunes store for an OS update before it can do more research.
Damn patches, you can't even escape them in space.

Or, it wants the latest version of Angry Birds ?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2 ... riosity_software_upgrade/

The Curiosity Rover will upgrade its operating system before getting down to serious science, NASA said today.

The Rover's onboard computer has wimpy specs, boasting just:

A BAE RAD 750 single-board computer with a 200Mhz Power PC CPU;
Two gigabytes of flash memory;
256 megabytes of DRAM;
256 kilobytes of electrically erasable programmable read-only memory.

At a press conference today, NASA suggested the latter is about to get a workout, with panellists saying the Rover's flight computer needs an upgrade before it can start to perform sophisticated experiments.
Only once the upgrade has been delivered and successfully installed will the Rover start to move or operate its more complex instruments, and at this morning's press conference the new OS was mentioned as a major risk factor.

Quote from Crashgate3 :

Come on NASA, get that high-gain antenna up, we want PICTURES DAMMIT.

It's up already (it was slightly mis-aligned due to a 1 degree azimuth error, which they fixed today by looking at the shadows the rover casted ) but from what I've heard, they'll still be sending photos and any larger data through the two orbiters instead of directly from the MSL as the orbiters offer more bandwidth thanks to much larger antennas. I guess the high-gain antenna on the MSL is just there for parameter tweaking directly when the orbiters aren't in the range of the rover.

First 360-degree color panorama should be coming tomorrow if everything goes smoothly, can't wait.

This is really fun, and the pictures are great! I love panorama pictures where you can turn the camera around

It's just a senseless waste of money, this science stuff. And closing NASA makes perfect economic sense.

Why, for the cost of this mission we could have paid 1/5th of the cost of these olympic games.
http://blogs.smithsonianmag.co ... ensive-than-the-olympics/

for 50-100 billion we could begin colonizing mars and take the next evolutionary step towards the immortality of mankind. Curiosity is a baby step in that direction but one that has to be made nonetheless. I watched a short special about the itinerary of the mission mapping the possible routes the rover will take up the base of the mountain. US only http://www.hulu.com/watch/310139

Quote from Racer X NZ :

It's just a senseless waste of money, this science stuff. And closing NASA makes perfect economic sense./

The air conditioning budget for the US troops in Afghanistan is larger than NASA's entire government-funded budget. There are a hell of a lot things which should have budget cuts before we start cancelling the one thing that might let this species survive more than another thousand years.

Quote from Crashgate3 :

The air conditioning budget for the US troops in Afghanistan is larger than NASA's entire government-funded budget. There are a hell of a lot things which should have budget cuts before we start cancelling the one thing that might let this species survive more than another thousand years.

Quote from Racer X NZ :

sarcasm note

to be frank, its sometimes hard to figure out what you're on about

Good.

Anything that gets people to think is a learning experience for them.
Disagreement is part of a healthy discussion.

I'd actually hoped that people may have picked the sarcasm about the Mar's lander costing 1/5th of the cost of the olympics but clearly not.

You don't want people to think, you want people to blindly believe whatever bullshit you feed them without checking other sources first, you're a hypocrite.

Quote from DeKo :

You don't want people to think, you want people to blindly believe whatever bullshit you feed them without checking other sources first, you're a hypocrite.

Wot a pile of cr@p.

Why do I post links ?

And, back on topic, science is how humanity moves forward, it's how we increase our knowledge. And what, precisly, does the Olympics add to human knowledge ?
Oh, cheating and bad sportsmanship. Like a banker.......

As I've said many times before, never believe me, do research and disagree with facts. Have a meaningful discussion regarding the topic, not the fact that my ideas may challenge your comfortable ignorance and you can't cope with that.

Racer X, if you're going to start this shit again, do it in a separate thread.

And for the record; communicating badly then acting smug when you're misunderstood, is neither big nor clever.

My humble apologies for trying to post on topic regarding the Mars mission.

I had thought that I was trying to say that this mission is important and the money is far better spent on scientific exploration rather than on bankers making $8US billion profit on the olympics.

I fully understand that this point of view makes me a terrorist who's focus is the overthrow of western civilisation.

Unlike the US govt who lie though their teeth on this subject.
And, interestingly enough they believe that only they are correct, no other opinions are accepted.

For those who are truly stupid, please accept that in my opinion the continued of funding scientific exploration is what we as humanity should be focussed on - this is what allows us to increase humanities knowledge.

http://9gag.com/gag/4967532?ref=hot

PS- great landing

Quote from Crashgate3 :

Racer X, if you're going to start this shit again, do it in a separate thread.

And for the record; communicating badly then acting smug when you're misunderstood, is neither big nor clever.

So, acting smug in your opinion is when your unable to either research or understand what I'm saying ?

My apologies for you not being capable of accepting that people may disagree with you. I very clearly understand just how correct you are on every subject and how anyone who disagrees is clearly wrong

That's sarcasm by the way in case you missed that as well !

Well, you bring it on yourself. Sarcasm only works if people are aware that it's sarcasm.

You're like the boy who cried wolf; you come out with these 'sarcastic' posts which are pretty much indistingishable from the conspiracist drivel you normally restrict yourself to, and then when it goes over everyone's head by about a mile and half, act all hurt and confused, and immediately start defensively slinging insults at everyone about how they're 'not thinking, maaaaaann...'

You'd do well to remember that everything you do is in the context of everything else you do. You can't just decide that hasn't happened then throw throw a tantrum when other people don't.

I try. I like to think that under the tinfoil hat you're an okay guy, but bloody hell you make it difficult sometimes.



Rant over, let's talk about how cool spaceships are.

Quote from Racer X NZ :

It's just a senseless waste of money, this science stuff. And closing NASA makes perfect economic sense.

Why, for the cost of this mission we could have paid 1/5th of the cost of these olympic games.
http://blogs.smithsonianmag.co ... ensive-than-the-olympics/

Quote from Racer X NZ :

But that wasn't sarcasm or cynicism. Perhaps you need to learn what they are and how to use them before pretending you're using them.

And suggesting that 5 of these missions could have been funded from the massive waste of money that the Olympics cost was too intelligent for you to get ?
Sorry Tristan, I thought that you at least may understand the concept of a budget.

Fair enough, I'll try to bring my comments down to a level that the people on the forum can understand.

I've tried pictures, but clearly even they go above you all, I'll try to dumb the thinking down so more people can understand.

You talk in a format that makes me think you are bi-polar, switching between theories and concepts - communicating these poorly across to the other people on the forum and then accuse them of being idiotic and stupid? Look at yourself man.

So cancel the Olympics is your solution then? Let's cancel football and every sport while we're at it..

I'd rather have 5 Mars missions than 25 Olympics. At least the Mars missions have the potential to enhance scientific understanding.

Have you got any good conspiracy theories Racer? You're paranoid and deluded enough to know of a few