I've been mentioning quite often lately that I'm reading a book about the Challenger Launch Decision and it has really opened my eyes about a number of business topics - organizational design, leadership, stats - that I can easier relate to real life or other, non-exclusive ideas. The problem, of course, is that my professor has asked us to analyze the book from a risk management point of view, so I have all this information I want to discuss and no reason to put it down on paper. Unlike a lot of students, I appreciate professor feedback when we criticize or analyze works, but I rarely get it, probably because students mistake a simple rebuttal for bias. I'm a little frustrated, and want to discuss this with someone else.

Hello, SEN!

In the shoutbox I've been coming down really hard on people about the normalization of data and false objectivity, and maybe I'll discuss that later. Instead, I want to focus more on what happens when the world becomes familiar with technology and information. Given that I'm reading about the Challenger disaster, I wanted to open with a movie. This movie was released twenty four years after the incident, right before the man that took the video died. Honestly, given the backlash and scandal that followed the disaster, I don't blame him for holding on to it. He eventually turned it over, and it has entered the public domain.

Please watch this video with the sound on, because the most important part is the reaction and discussion right before, during, and after the incident. Try to remove yourself from the abundance of knowledge we have about the incident today.




In honesty, it seemed like they were being a bit nonchalant about the "trouble." I don't think they understood the ramifications, and hey who could blame them? Although Challenger was a big deal due to the teacher on board, it still was routine. Statistics say only 15% of America watched the launch. I'm not sure how many of you have watched Apollo 13 (a great movie, by the way), but that also sums up America's views of space travel even then, when NASA was it its finest and highest staffed; it was nearly routine even then. There is a scene when the wife wants to know why the Apollo 13 mission isn't on television - its because, simply, most people didn't care. The only reason people started to care was because there was a chance that everyone on board might die. Some people may have watched out of genuine concern for the astronauts - I'm willing to bet it was closer to the same reason we instinctually turn our head when we hear a car horn and screeching brakes - we want to see the crash.

Regardless, when technology and information becomes regular, we lose our interest in it. NASA is largely funded by the government through our taxes - why should we pay for a program that offers us, from a general point of view, no immediate value? We don't. This was during a time when Reagan was slashing the budget left and right (and indeed, on a somewhat related note, this is pointed to as a main cause for why the Challenger failed; NASA got much less than was needed for this program from the government). The most unfortunate part was that it is clear to me that NASA wanted to move away from solely government funding. The Challenger missions were to make space routine and to provide services for the Air Force as well as corporations who needed to deploy things in space. Perhaps it would have succeeded had it not been destroyed on its last mission - but its hard to tell...the Challenger had numerous problems that would've popped up later.

Perhaps a similar, non-space related example is Wikipedia. I think it is outstanding how much information you can find on Wikipedia alone. But who cares? I'd wager that had Wikipedia existed forty years ago, that generation would not have left that site in a great hurry. And it is worth pointing out that many people go on "wikiwalks" - you go from page to page on Wikipedia, just for kicks. Personally, I think Wikipedia has spoiled us all and it will get worse with every generation. Wikipedia is great at remaining unbiased (although, from a seminary friend, I hear that once you get into some deeper articles on Catholicism lulzy infighting occurs from different sects over technicalities), but part of reading critically is being able to read a sentence and say, "oh, that's loaded because of xyz" or "I'll need a second opinion on this." am I overreacting? I don't know. But I doubt many people know more about Challenger - or Columbia, for that matter - beyond the accidents that occurred. Since then, NASA has been suffocated with red tape; I don't believe the organization has much time left.

But something positive has come of all of this, I believe. Companies such as Virgin and Lockheed are coming up with pretty awesome designs for spacecraft. SpaceShipOne, the first private space flight, happened only in 2004. These are big times, guys. Tickets for SpaceShipTwo, last I heard, is going for $80,000. It gives me hope that maybe public apathy isn't killing outer space.

If you are still hesitant to believe in what I'm saying, I don't blame you. For the most part, this community has people that care about space travel or technology and information in general. But when you look at a broader spectrum, its easier to lose faith in humanity.

I'll leave you with this thought: on Friday, two events are happening on the 29th of April: the royal wedding, and the final flight of Space Shuttle Endeavour. Which one is America going ga-ga for?

Elegant

It really is hard to have people understand the importance of certain things. These thoughts have cropped up when I was studying social psych, and yeah, it does certainly make you lose hope of humanity once in a while...

To be honest, though, it's the way we function.
The Royal Wedding is more endearing to people because it is about celebrities. Celebrities are well known strictly because people made them to be. Moreover, a wedding is much more personable than a Space shuttle flight.

What royal wedding? Royalty still exists? I thought that stuff was more or less phased out after WWI.

Post has been edited 2 time(s), last time on Apr 27 2011, 7:43 pm by Sacrieur.

The Royal Family are great publicists. NASA, not so much.

When they blow up stuff though, then it is all over the news. We need to send a message to NASA:

Dear NASA,

Instead of going to Mars can we just blow it up? You'll get more funding that way.

The Shuttle program was predicted at its beginning to have a failure rate of something like 1 or 2%. 2 disasters in 87 missions -- pretty on target. Imagine being one of the astronauts that agreed to these missions. How's that for risk management?

Aside from that, luckily there are people with interest in this field, myself being one of them. More than that, lots of companies want to utilize space for satellites and stuff. What's the discussion topic here again though? I read it all and I'm not sure what you wanted to discuss.

The topic isn't very well guided, I admit that. I was mainly discussing how I feel that the space program is dying a dignified death, which like I said is a mixed blessing. I was hoping to get some other perspectives on technology and information familiarity, but I haven't seen a lot of it.

Also, I am greatly impressed by NASAs record. At the same time, I don't think anyone would go into space without knowing that there are some serious risks.

The royal wedding... of course over 1 - 2 billion people will watch Kate and Will's wedding. The challenger not so much as you hit the nail on the hammer (technology is no longer exciting once it hits a point).

There was a very low budget, the tax cuts led to tax cuts on the actual design of the shuttle. For one most of the panels on the bottom of the space shuttle challenger were improper only slapped on to it because it was protocol to have full panels. This was suppose to be the mission that made NASA popular again. Many people at NASA thought that because they had a civilian on board it would lead to a who industry of a space vacation.

Uh wait. Are you talking about Columbia or Challenger? Columbia burned up due to panel malfunction. Challenger blew up because the o-rings in one of the SRBs failed.

People don't care about shuttle launches anymore because the news doesn't bother to tell us what the hell their missions are anymore.
Apollo 8 "Where going to the dark side of the moon, loosing all radio contact. Hold your breathe as he epically come back around."
Apollo 11 "sup moon"
Columbia "We're gonna try and land this thing"
We had something to look forward to each time. It was clear what were doing, and what we would learn or get out of it.

Since then, all we are told is "Hey, there's some people going back into space again" Why? To do what? If they are just going up there for the sake of being thorough, and redoing tired and meaningless experiments with cats in weightlessness; then I don't want to fund that with my money or attention.

Actually the study of microgravity in the area of microbiology has led to several breakthroughs. Additionally research about the effect of weightlessness on humans, must be done so we can travel to Mars without everyone dying.

---

And space is cool man.

You don't get it. The point is the news never mentions that.

That's still 36 million out of America's 240 million citizens in 1986. But yeah, a lot of people don't care about scientific progress. They just want a shinier iPod, or some superficial gossip from a tabloid.

I absolutely agree with you that a lot of people are complacent, and not just about obtaining knowledge, but also about skills, achievements and their spiritual world in general. I don't see it as a result of us being 'spoiled' in a sense of availability of information; I think we're just immature as a society. We've managed to satisfy all our basic needs a thousand times over creating a lot of excess, but we're only beginning to understand the importance of developing ourselves as individuals.

When you consider how young the human race is, its no surprise we're immature. I just hope we live past maturity.

I think to a certain point we are spoiled, though. I hate to dig up this corpse but my biggest beef is genetically modified food. I don't like the purists saying its all evil, or confusing cross breeding with genetically enhancing. I feel like yes, we are spoiled, because we want our food organic and I feel that those who don't make much and don't care suffer as a result. I'm glad both options exist, honestly. I think a lot of people want their cake and they want to eat it too; they want low food costs and to eliminate starvation but they aren't willing to compromise on quality. Really, other than quality, there isn't much difference between most genetically modified foods and organic (apparently it tastes better but hunger is the best spice).

And if you don't approve of that argument, speaking of food prices, compare a food bill for a television and groceries for four people for a month. Surprisingly close, I think, and I think the problem there is that technology is so much cheaper to produce than food. When we develop a replicator all of our problems will go away, right?

Replicators would cause a worldwide unemployment problem.

Who'd need a job when there's no money?

or a financial problem and an energy crisis.

EDIT: OK, Kame says no money

Isn't that joke made in the Voyage Home? "Let me guess, they don't have money in the future."

Yeah, they learn that they still use money in the 90s.

"The love of money is the root of all evil."

So let's get rid of money right?