Bronze-level articleNASA

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{{sciencenav}}{{bronze}}[[File:NASA logo.svg|thumb|left|150px|The "meatball" logo. The name suggests deep [[Scientology#Operation Snow White|covert infiltration]] by followers of the [[Flying Spaghetti Monster|FSM]].]]
 
{{sciencenav}}{{bronze}}[[File:NASA logo.svg|thumb|left|150px|The "meatball" logo. The name suggests deep [[Scientology#Operation Snow White|covert infiltration]] by followers of the [[Flying Spaghetti Monster|FSM]].]]
'''NASA''' is an [[socialism|evil machine]] of [[liberal deceit]] which wastes decent, hardworking, [[Christian]] [[tax]] dollars on "proving" that [[Earth]] is, get this, ''[[Flat Earth|round]]'', and ''[[Geocentrism|orbits the sun]]''. No really, that's exactly what these loopnuts believe. Pray for them, that they might point their telescopes to [[Heaven]]. [[George C. Deutsch]], the NASA spokesperson under [[George W. Bush|President Bush II]], said so!
 
  
==What it does==
 
 
As the name suggests, the '''N'''ational  '''A'''eronautics and '''S'''pace '''A'''dministration<ref>The acronym is often decoded as "Never a Straight Answer" by people who wouldn't recognise a straight answer if it hits them in the head, or as "Need Another Seven Astronauts" by people who lack decency. Often the two groups overlap.</ref> is a [[US]] government agency that is charged with [[space]] exploration and research in aeronautical and space engineering.
 
As the name suggests, the '''N'''ational  '''A'''eronautics and '''S'''pace '''A'''dministration<ref>The acronym is often decoded as "Never a Straight Answer" by people who wouldn't recognise a straight answer if it hits them in the head, or as "Need Another Seven Astronauts" by people who lack decency. Often the two groups overlap.</ref> is a [[US]] government agency that is charged with [[space]] exploration and research in aeronautical and space engineering.
  

Revision as of 22:16, 6 April 2013

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The "meatball" logo. The name suggests deep covert infiltration by followers of the FSM.

As the name suggests, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration[1] is a US government agency that is charged with space exploration and research in aeronautical and space engineering.

Contrary to popular misconceptions:

  • NASA doesn't do astronomy, unless the observatory is on a plane (SOFIA) or in space (Hubble, Spitzer, etc.); even then, most of the people that actually use these instruments are professional astronomers who don't work for NASA (Hubble, for example, is used through the Space Telescope Science Institute)
    • Speaking of space telescopes, it seems that only space geeks know that Hubble is not the only one. Wikipedia has a nice list.
  • NASA doesn't have a monopoly on space flight within the United States:
    • the Armed Forces have their own space projects (e.g. the X-37B) and their own launchpads; NASA's shuttles have launched some spy satellites, but it turned out that launching them with disposable rockets is cheaper.
    • commercial satellites are not launched by NASA, but by private contractors (such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing and Orbital Sciences Corporation); the same people provide launch services to NASA and other government agencies (such as launching meteosats for NOAA and spysats for the NRO)
  • NASA doesn't have a monopoly on space flight outside of the US:
    • there are other government agencies, most notably Roscosmos (the Russian one), ESA (the joint European one) and JAXA[2] (the Japanese one)
    • and other commercial launch providers such as Arianespace
  • Contrary to the popular (in some circles) slogan "NASA lies!", the most significant things NASA has been untruthful about are:
    • how much money a particular project will cost
    • how much time it will take to develop it

Well, the last point is mostly snark, but based on a kernel of truth: NASA's projects often end up over budget and/or behind schedule (Recent examples are the cancelled Constellation program and the James Webb Space Telescope[3]).

NASA takes its directions from the President and its money from the Congress. This sometimes leads to some interesting deals and compromises (and fucked-up projects, including the current state of the human spaceflight program).

Contents

Space exploration spending

NASA's budget as a percentage of the national budget, 1962-2008

A lot of people think (or at least have expressed the opinion)[4] that a lot of money is spent on space exploration and could be better spent elsewhere. In the case of NASA, this is undermined by the fact that a) nowadays, NASA's budget is less than 1% of the federal budget, and b) the average American has no idea how small NASA's budget actually is. According to a 2007 survey:

...we asked respondents what percentage of the national budget is allocated to NASA and to the Department of Defense, the Department of Education, the Department of Agriculture, and the Department of Health and Human Services, among other agencies. NASA’s allocation, on average, was estimated to be approximately 24% of the national budget (the NASA allocation in 2007 was approximately 0.58% of the budget.)[5]

See also

External links

Footnotes

  1. The acronym is often decoded as "Never a Straight Answer" by people who wouldn't recognise a straight answer if it hits them in the head, or as "Need Another Seven Astronauts" by people who lack decency. Often the two groups overlap.
  2. The X stands for eXploration. But at least their logo doesn't include a mecha.
  3. Space science: The telescope that ate astronomy, Nature News. There's a nice graph of the "cost curve."
  4. One can't be always sure that some kind of thought process is going on.
  5. Mary Lynne Dittmar, Sustaining exploration: communications, relevance, and value, The Space Review
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