Out of the shadows

Hello there ATS. I'm not exactly good at this introduction thing so I'll try my best to appease and amuse. My name is Jackal (An alias of course) and it is a pleasure to finally have an account. I used to be satisfied with debating people in the YouTube comments with topics ranging from the Moon landing, 9/11, race baiting, religion and just general chit-chat. I'm an avid space enthusiast and believe we should be further and higher than we are now. I'm also into politics and plan on trying to run for office whenever I meet the age requirements. I have my own beliefs and respect the beliefs of others unless they turn militant. There are a few more personal details that my receptionist put on these notes I'm paraphrasing, but I don't think you really need to know that my favorite food is Fettuccine Alfredo with seasoned and grilled chicken. Anywho, if you have any more questions about who I am, or my beliefs feel free to ask. I'll try to be a book with only a few pages glued together.

Also... Can someone please give me a working link to the ATS media site or whatever it is? I cannot seem to get my avatar to work properly.

Welcome to ATS Jackal.

Nice intro.

And a wise decision to move on from the YouTube comments section.
That community is, shall we say, less developed than what you'll find here.


Have a great evening.

a reply to: CharlieSpeirs

Thanks for the warm welcome. The sheer ignorance in the YT comment section is almost as bad as GLP. Almost.

a reply to: DarkerJackal

Hey DJ. You say

I'm an avid space enthusiast and believe we should be further and higher than we are now.

I'm a long time dreamer of space flight myself and think as you do in that quote. So what do you think. Is it poor funding? Unexpected technical difficulties, Van Allen Belt, aliens, what. Why to you think we are not further and higher along as you indicate?

OH yeah, welcome

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

Politics. Back in the Cold War it was a sabre rattling contest, who could one-up the other. America beat the Soviets to the Moon, the Soviets couldn't get their lunar rocket to work. Plus at the time it wasn't the most efficient way to launch things into orbit. Now-a-days it's because the good ol' gooberment has their finger firmly on the "Defensive Spending" button. They enjoy having this much control, them and their lobbyist friends. If NASA had the budget they had when we went to the moon today, we'd have boots on Mars before 2023. We'd have asteroids and meteoroids being mined right above our heads.

Think about it like this; If you had control of a certain resource and enjoyed making a large profit from it, would you really want competition to mine, refine and sell it for cheaper?

So my two big reasons, Politics and Economics. The gooberment has no reason to really look up, and the corporations are comfortable with the profits the have.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

And thank you for the welcoming question, I enjoy excercising my mind with questions like that and trying to explain the way I see things.

a reply to: DarkerJackal
Yeah, I have to wonder too. Back then was it only a saber rattling dance? I mean there was the race with the Russians and all but there was also a dream. Like all we had to do was apply ourselves and today would be like you suggest, moon bases, Mars bases and mining the asteroids. Maybe, but at least, at least a fine orbiting space station with world class science labratories in it and small but functioning societies. But all we have, and this is even an international project, that space station that is really to my mind little more than a 'shed' floating out there, hardly a station there really, just barely a life boat.

Now, I do not hold with the 'it was a hoax' gang about the moon landing. I think it happened as popular history generally depicts, but I also think that it was much more expensive than originally projected and the pay off was not nearly as lucrative as hoped for.

I know that taxpayers were backing off of the dream as it promised little to better their lives and government had to cut programs, but I wonder that it may have been deeper than that. And corporations also were not pouring money into the dream as the profit seemed to far in the future and we know that corporations want profit now, in the short term.

And now I wonder at the idea of sending man into space at all, at least for a while. I mean with all the computer advances it would seem to me that we could pilot robots to the moon to do the mining and stuff, if there really was anything there worth mining. We don't need to send people at all, just machines. But even that seems to be moving oh so slowly slowly s l o w l y.

In the 1950s I started reading my uncles science fiction novels. Back then they were mostly like simple stories about moon colonies and space stations and farms on Mars. Even that big movie from back in what was it 68, called 2001 was seemed not an unrealistic possibility but whatta we got now? Hardly anything. I am so disapointed. I'm getting old now and that dream I held way back then in the 60s when we supposedly landed on the moon are now very tarnished and I hold little hope for something more in my life time. Alas.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

Unfortunately that dream rode on the back of the nightmarish Mil/Ind complex, the launch vehicles were developed from ICBMs and the information gathered from the launches were used to make more efficient missiles. It's rather hard to apply oneself when the ones that hold authority over you have an agenda that differs from yours. It's kind of like when Hoaxers say NASA stands for Never a straight answer; It's hard to give one when you are censored and restrained.

The monetary payoff might have been null but the advancements made in simplifying and shrinking electronics was worth it. Plus, it would seem that an interest in space is being sparked ever so slightly once more. We now have private industries looking to invest higher and higher into the Z-axis now that it is becoming more affordable. (At least to companies. I'm still waiting on tourism to the ISS.)

Sending a robot may seem better, but a robot can't perform on the fly tests on a whim like a human can, or think outside of the box to solve a problem. As exploration for landing sites? Yes. As a long term solution to explore our solar system? Maybe. Will it satisfy that genetic disposition for humans to explore and discover? Nope. I just hope that we can get about crossing our new ocean before we cross ourselves out.

I still hold out hope that we'll get our collective heads from our rumps and get the ball rolling. It's not just for scientific reasons but for survival in my opinion. One big feckin' rock is all it takes to sterilize this planet, and there are a lot of big feckin' rocks out there.

IDK, maybe I'm holding onto my hope foolishly, but I still hope we take our place among the stars and survive another couple thousand years.

Watsup new here to

a reply to: Matthew2828

Heya, what's up.