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Discussion about Space:1999.
Future Shock
Was SPACE:1999 a bit too optimistic?
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| Validus 16 Jan 2003 07:40:37 |
I can't speak for anyone else, but back in the post-Watergate mid 70's the year 1999 seemed so far in the future. I think many of us took it for granted that we'd be tooling around the solar system and that we actually would have a base (or more likely bases) on the Moon. Well, here we are in the year 2003 and we don't have jet backs or daily flights to Mars. Was SPACE:1999 a bit too optimistic (as was it seems 2001: A Space Odyssey)?  What's the concensus? |
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| gba_cmdr 16 Jan 2003 15:42:38 |
Most definitely -- for something that was only set 25 years in the future -- it was most optimistic. If you think of all the "failed" missions that were mentioned in Year 1 episodes, the space program of the 80s/90s was vast... Sadly, as you mention, we never got NEAR that reality. The real 2000s seem so....mundane. And -- most definitely, the year 1999 seemed VERY far away and futuristic in 1975...ah to be a child again. |
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| chadman 16 Jan 2003 16:02:46 |
I think you have to look at the time when Space:1999 was made. As you say, 1999 was over 20 years away. Man had been to the moon, there were other lunar missions going on, so I suppose it was only logical to presume that some form of base (no matter how small) would eventually exist before the decade was over and that great technological leaps would be made - at least I did (then again I was only 6 years old when Space:1999 hit the screens!). So in that respect, no, I don't think Space:1999 was being too optimstic. |
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| gba_cmdr 16 Jan 2003 16:06:59 |
Chadman -- I agree 100%, but in the context of today, Space:1999 was too optimistic. But most definitely, as an 11 year old, I thought it was right on the mark! I couldn't wait for 1999/2000 for Moonbase Alpha! |
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| Flamegrape 16 Jan 2003 16:33:20 |
The Apollo space program was a collosal waste of money. I know that sounds strange coming from a sci-fi fan. But over the last couple of decades, I've come to realise that. We were just in a rush to get to the moon first before the Russians and that's all. The space shuttle was a better idea, but still not perfect. I've heard that we will start to employ re-useable space planes with no external fuel tanks, which is even better. The fact is that we were already going in the right direction with the rocket "X" planes that Chuck Yeager was testing back in the '50s and early '60s. But then Kennedy said we had to go to the moon before the decade was out. I think the race to the moon was a bad idea. We should have taken our time and wasted less money. The best sort of spaceship would be a craft that takes off like an airplane, flies into orbit, and then lands like an airplane. |
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| gba_cmdr 16 Jan 2003 18:35:22 |
I disagree -- in hindsight, it may look like a collosal waste, but at the time I think (and still do) that it was a bold and forward looking venture. It's unfortunate that budgt cutbacks to fund social programs caused the Apollo missions and NASA itself to lose some perspective. The Space Shuttle program needs to be badly updated. It's a system from the 80s developed in the 70s. The entire space program needs an overhaul with a new sharp focus and proper funding. A moonbase should not be out of the question either. All of these things bring immeasurable benefits not only to countries that do the work, but to the world at large. Perhaps if we all were watching Moon launches, we wouldn't be preoccupied with thoughts of war (or go to war for that matter....of course, Vietnam was being fought as we landed on the Moon...) |
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| Validus 16 Jan 2003 20:34:59 |
I once read an interview with Arthur C. Clarke where he was asked this same question re: 2001 and where we should be and "why we aren't there yet". Clarke blamed the derailment of NASA and the space program on two things- the Vietnam War and the political turmoil caused by Richard Nixon's abominable uses of Presidential power. I'm inclined to agree with him to a large extent. I also wonder how damaged NASA was by the whole Apollo 13 disaster. I'm certainly not a scientist, but it seems to me that if we are ever going to advance outward into the solar system we will eventually need to construct as base on the Moon. Even if just as a "jumping off point" to Mars and Venus. As for the Space Shuttle- well, I've always believed in my heart that the Space Shuttle was really a cold war weapon. After all, we really have no idea what the shuttle carries into space. . . |
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| Eagle One 16 Jan 2003 23:20:03 |
Space 1999's problem with the future development of the space program was linear extroplation of the current space program. New tech doesn't develop that way. Most things humans are involved with develop at an uneven pace. Either very slowly or in sudden bursts of revolutionary creativity. This doesn't fit the very linear model the type of space program required for a Space 1999 type program. I think Challanger fiasco was more damning to the space program than Apollo 13. We were very luck Apollo 13 didn't turn into a disaster. The reason the space program got off track was most Americans do not see any real value in it. On average Americans do not value knowledge for the sake of knowledge unless one can do something practical with it or be entertained. Some will claim their are major technological benefits from a space program but for the most part, that doesn't seem to be so. The only two I can think of are *Velcro *Tang and I'm not sure about one of them...anyone else think of new technology created by the space program? I think our technology has to develop more before see can see the type of space program we want. |
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| Eagle One 16 Jan 2003 23:25:31 |
Also the Cold War was worth winning so we should not under estimate the importance of the space race in the 60's. It helped establish America's rep as technological power house because we proved we could so something the Russians couldn't. America had been seen as lagging behind the USSR in hard science in many ways because the Soviets put the first man ordit and had the first satellite in orbit. The moon landing helped change that perception. | ||
| Validus 17 Jan 2003 03:35:58 |
"Space-Age" technology has manifested inself in odd ways. My understanding is that Teflon and Kevlar were both developed originally for the space program. Certainly the technology that enables us to have this forum owes much to early advances in computer science that would not have been possible without NASA (and the Pentagon). The telecommunication webs that now bind the earth like the neurons of the brain also owe much to "Space-Age" advances. It is an unfortunate truth that many of our greatest advances have been made because of fear and loathing of our fellow man. The commercial airlines that cross the various oceans & continants of the world would not have been possible except for the early need for long range bombers capable of flying from here to Russia and back. The geneology of our Rocket technology goes back to Von Braun and the 3rd Reich. . . something people at NASA don't like to discuss whenever possible. . . Personally I feel that science has given far more then it has taken, I would never want to see a return back to the Middle-Ages. |
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| JYM 17 Jan 2003 05:20:10 |
And what about the movie '' Minority report'' with Tom Cruise!! The action is in 2054!!!! They are VERY optimistic!  |
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| Validus 17 Jan 2003 10:03:57 |
I hope that you're being ironic....I found Minority Report to be both a stunning film and also a very savage attack on State Power and Consumer Culture. One of the things that sometimes depresses me is that my favorite science fiction film-Bladerunner (check out bladezone.com if your as big as fan as me) is set in the year 2019. Los Angelis seems to be quickly literalizing the most unsavory aspects of city life as depicted in this stunning film. I still hold out hope that I will live long enough to see a base built on the Moon.....and I hope it is called "Alpha". |
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| gba_cmdr 17 Jan 2003 16:49:07 |
Well I share that hope to -- but I don't think we'll see Alpha as the name of the Moonbase, sadly. The International Space Station was supposedly named "Alpha" but that (supposedly) created all sorts of problems with other countries of the world so the Alpha was dropped. The first captain called it Alpha, but I'm not sure if any of the current astronaut visitors are doiing so. |
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| Validus 19 Jan 2003 09:15:40 |
The depressing reality is that when a base is finally built on the Moon it will probably be named after either the company that built it, or if the United States does it we can count on it being someone from our History. I cringe at the thought of "Armstrong Center" or "Microsoft Base" but that's probably what we'll end up with. (sigh)  ....and doubtless the bastards will install a fucking Starbucks right next to Main Mission. |
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| Borg Duck 21 Jan 2003 22:25:32 |
 Wait! are you so naive??  Everyone knows that we allready have secret bases on the moon and we have technology the aliens gave us and we test flight our spaceships at Roswell! |
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| Validus 23 Jan 2003 02:49:34 |
Is that the same base where the Illuminati is secretly keeping Elvis and the still living brain of Hitler in a jar? | ||
| Borg Duck 23 Jan 2003 20:53:40 |
 Yes, alongside a captured Yeti and the brain of Morbius! |
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| DX-SFX 26 Jan 2003 12:29:18 |
Wasn't Mylar (that lightweight metallic insulating film that the Lunar Module descent stage was covered in) a development of the space program? That and variations on it crop up everywhere nowadays. I don't think the Apollo project was a huge waste of money. There is no doubt that the motivation for doing it was political but it would still inevitably have happened at some time. How do you guage a waste of money? NASA could have spread out each mission over a twenty year period but the money would still have been spent. It just happened to have been spent over a much shorter period. You've also got to look at it from the perspective of the sixties. This was the first time that man had gone to another planet (yes I know it's not technically a planet). This was a huge cultural change of thinking. We hadn't even gone into space until a few years before. We had no idea what scientific benefits the moon could bring but without going to find out we would never know. It's easy to be wise with the benifit of hindsight that had we known the moon offered much less in the way of financial rewards we probably wouldn't have invested as much in the project. There are hundreds of other unseen benefits too. The research into high speed flight that makes the new generation of suborbital airliners now in development like HOTOL which will allow flight times from London to Australia in two and a half hours!!! That's not a benefit? The medical data that has been accumulated into the human bodies reaction to prolonged periods of being weightless lays the ground rules for the "design" of future space projects. Learning about the origin and chemical composition of the Moon helps to answer the fundimental questions about the origin of the Universe. How do you guage in monetary terms the cultural effect of that photo taken by Apollo 8 of the Earth seen from space for the first time as this tiny little oasis of colour in an infinity of blackness. In that one shot eveyones perception was changed and from that moment (quite rightfully) the concept of enviromental concerns was born. If you want to think in practical terms be grateful for the satellites that allow global communications or the monitoring of what certain dictators in the far east are up to! Apollo may have been a costly first step but if you want to run you've got to learn to walk. I'd hate to think that any scientific research program was given the go ahead based on what profit there might be in it. That's a corporate way of thinking in which case they ain't in it for the science, they're in it for the bucks. Was the space program expensive? Maybe! Waste of money? Definitely not! It all goes towards the future survival of the human race and the planet. Chris |
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| Flamegrape 26 Jan 2003 14:44:52 |
You missed my point. I said that the Apollo program was a waste. Not the entire space program. Communications satellites are a good idea and rockets are a great way to launch them. But I think rockets are a terrible way of launching people into space. As I said earlier in this thread, we were on a good slow and steady track with those X planes back in the 1950s and early 1960s. Then we dropped all that just so we could get to the moon before the Russians. The technology that came out of the space program was wonderful. But it all would have developed anyway in similar manners. Being flung over the horizon by carefully balancing on an exploding mountain of fire looks cool but you're not going to get me on one of those things. Riding on something like an airplane is more accessible to the public. Right now, private industries have little interest in spending billions in non-reusable rockets for manned travel. Instead they are using them for satellites, and that's a good idea. If spaceships were more common like airplanes and ships, then our expansion throughout the solar system would be happening. It's not going to happen by putting living people in the warheads of missles. |
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| Cindy 26 Jan 2003 18:58:46 |
I think the commandant of the moonbase (according Borq Duck) is G.W. Bush who is the bigger awful of aliens. And it's too late because our earth is invaded by aliens. |
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