Google Groups no longer supports new Usenet posts or subscriptions. Historical content remains viewable.
Dismiss

The Cold Equations

19 views
Skip to first unread message

Brian Pickrell

unread,
Feb 10, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/10/97
to

[ The story so far: In the science fiction story _The Cold Equations,_ a
young female stowaway on a spaceship has to be tossed out the airlock
because there isn't enough fuel to land with the additional mass aboard.
The author's intended message was that the laws of nature are unforgiving.
Richard Harter blames the authorities instead, for failing to take
adequate precautions against stowaways. He also blames the author, Tom
Godwin, for a blame-the-victim mentality... ]

Bernard Peek (b...@intersec.demon.co.uk) wrote:
: In article <5dlg4h$o...@news-central.tiac.net>, Richard Harter
: <c...@tiac.net> writes

: >
: >>In fact your criticism of the original story is based on additional
: >>material that you fabricated.
: >
: >You make a point of a sort. I did not make it as clear as I might
: >have what they *did* not do, steps that are obvious. I quote:

: You made it clear that you felt that these were obvious, but failed to
: demonstrate that this follows from the text. The method by which the
: girl gains access to the ship isn't discussed in any detail, and
: therefore can't sensibly be subject to


: >
: >You would be wrong. The pilot does not make a routine
: >check for stowaways and feels no remorse for not
: >having done so. No effort is made to keep stowaways
: >out except for an uninformative sign. Nothing stops the
: >young woman from just wandering on board.
: >
: >If it makes you happy I will follow the author and call her a girl.
: >Now what was not done in the story?
: >
: >There is no lock on the door.
: >The girl is not informed of the policy.
: >The sign does not say anything about stowaways.
: >The pilot does not check his vehicle before taking off.

: I don't recall this being stated.

: >
: >These are routine, obvious precautions. The threat of a stowaway
: >is serious; so serious that the pilot is issued a blaster. Yet the
: >obvious precautions are not taken. All of this is quite clear in the
: >story.

: >
: >The author wished to set up a certain situation, one in which a
: >certain moral would hold. The simple fact is that he was sloppy about
: >doing so. I sympathize with him. Writing fiction is work; setting up
: >scenarios in which all the bases are covered takes quite a bit of
: >thought.

: And the effort involved couln't really be justified because it wouldn't
: have materially affected the story, except possibly to bury it in
: padding. The author's point was that the laws of gravity can't be
: repealed. It made the point succinctly and effectively, witness the
: story is still being discussed decades later.

I have to agree with Mr. Harter here. A writer should be able to set up a
scene adequately and concisely without leaving huge logical gaps. For
instance:

'Jeepers!' said the pilot, 'how did you get on board? Entry to this
area is carefully controlled, and there are warning signs telling you that
stowing away is very dangerous.'

'Oh, I slipped past the sensors,' replied the girl. 'And I never read
warning signs. But don't worry, I'm young and beautiful and my daddy's
rich, so the rules don't apply to me.'

Okay, it still needs a little more brushing up, but you get the idea.

: > Given the economics of writing short fiction (ASF paid three
: >cents a word at the time and they were the market leader) one, of
: >necessity, grinds the stuff out.

That's three cents more than I'm getting for writing this. Maybe I won't
bother brushing it up.

: >
: >Now it is quite clear what moral the author wished to draw, wished to
: >present to us. (Although the odds are that it was Campbell's idea and
: >Godwin wrote it on order.) But if we look at the situation actually
: >presented in the story it does not support the moral; that is the
: >first point of the essay.

: I understand that to be your premise. The story, as written, does
: support the moral (not really the right word in this context, morality
: was excluded from the central premise of the story). Your revised form
: may not, but it isn't the story that Godwin wrote.

: > The second point is that the situation
: >really supports a different and much uglier moral - that of
: >bureaucratic callousness and rationalization of that callousness. The
: >third point is that this fundamental defect escapes the editor (not
: >surprising) and the SF community.

: It's obviously possible to read this into the story, you've done it. I
: wouldn't have considered the issues you raise to have been important to
: the story, and now that you've pointed them out, I still don't. Over-
: reading can torture almost any story into supporting almost any theory
: about its contents. It's pointless because the criticism becomes a work
: of fiction in its own right, owing little to the original text.

: I'm sure that had Godwin thought that the points you raised were worth
: the effort he would have thrown in an extra paragraph to deal with them.
: Personally I think the effort would have been a wasted effort.

It tells a lot about the author (and his audience) to note which points he
thought were worth covering, and which he didn't. In this case, the
underlying assumption is that rockets are dangerous machinery, that
there's no margin for error, and that everyone ought to know that. Would
_The Cold Equations_ have the same effect if it was set in a rowboat?

The reason I crossposted this article is that the same premise is in
effect today. The Space Shuttle is still vulnerable to single-point
failures; if something goes wrong, everybody gets blown up. This is a
fundamental design defect, and space travel will never be practical until
the rocket designers abandon the _Cold Equations_ mentality and decide
that exposing passengers to this kind of danger is simply not acceptable.

: There's a more serious criticism of the work. The additional mass of the
: girl would have been detected almost instantly because of its effect on
: the course of the ship. The only way she could have avoided it would
: have been to discard her own mass in other objects. Had she done that it
: would have negated the entire central premise.

: >
: >It is the final point that is most damning of SF, in my opinion. The
: >story is a fine bit of melodrama and people respond to the melodrama
: >and the authors moralizaing without thinking about what actually went
: >on in the story. That is slop. Slop is the norm in SF.

: Hard SF of this vintage, particularly at short story length, was usually
: written around one central idea. The central idea in this case is that
: there are situations when the universe won't let you win.

: When I run management training courses I often set up at least one role-
: play scenario as a lose/lose situation. To avoid any accusations of
: unfairness I use situations that really happened. The Cold Equations was
: a scenario of that type. I realise it's unpleasant to realise that in
: some situations you can't win, but the universe is like that sometimes.

--
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Brian Pickrell

Bill MacArthur

unread,
Feb 11, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/11/97
to

I can't believe that this thread has returned! It seems to me that you
have stored this on disk, stewed over it and reposted.

pma...@eskimo.com (Brian Pickrell) wrote:
>[ The story so far: In the science fiction story _The Cold Equations,_ a
>young female stowaway on a spaceship has to be tossed out the airlock
>because there isn't enough fuel to land with the additional mass aboard.
>The author's intended message was that the laws of nature are unforgiving.
>Richard Harter blames the authorities instead, for failing to take
>adequate precautions against stowaways. He also blames the author, Tom
>Godwin, for a blame-the-victim mentality... ]
>

People are not victims when they suffer the consequences of dumb ass
mistakes.


>'Jeepers!' said the pilot, 'how did you get on board? Entry to this
>area is carefully controlled, and there are warning signs telling you that
>stowing away is very dangerous.'
>
>'Oh, I slipped past the sensors,' replied the girl. 'And I never read
>warning signs. But don't worry, I'm young and beautiful and my daddy's
>rich, so the rules don't apply to me.'
>
>Okay, it still needs a little more brushing up, but you get the idea.
>

I think if you criticize the story with quotation marks you should quote
it verbatim. The story made the point that she had been warned but she
just didn't believe it. I don't remember reading anything about sensors
in stories of that era. Naval analogies were far more prevalent.

BTW do rich brats not behave in the manner you described? Or poor brats
for that manner? How many young lives are snuffed out through
misadventure such as River Phoenix's a few years ago? How many die of
alcohol/drug related deaths, car accidents, AIDS and general
misadventure? Weren't they adequately warned?


>It tells a lot about the author (and his audience) to note which points he
>thought were worth covering, and which he didn't. In this case, the
>underlying assumption is that rockets are dangerous machinery, that
>there's no margin for error, and that everyone ought to know that. Would
>_The Cold Equations_ have the same effect if it was set in a rowboat?
>

You have missed the point completely. This is a cautionary tale. The
point is that the universe is uncaring. It does want to save us or kill
us, it just is and we have to live with it. As for your rowboat story,
read some sea stories. Start with _The Cruel Sea_.


>The reason I crossposted this article is that the same premise is in
>effect today. The Space Shuttle is still vulnerable to single-point
>failures; if something goes wrong, everybody gets blown up. This is a
>fundamental design defect, and space travel will never be practical until
>the rocket designers abandon the _Cold Equations_ mentality and decide
>that exposing passengers to this kind of danger is simply not acceptable.
>

I'm glad you weren't around when Columbus was ready to sail. The Nina,
Pinta and Santa Maria would still be in dry- dock.


Edward Wright

unread,
Feb 11, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/11/97
to

In article <JMC.97Fe...@Steam.stanford.edu>, j...@Steam.stanford.edu
says...

>Aircraft are subject to single-point failures. All it takes is one
>bomb. The design of the Shuttle involved as much redundancy as could
>be afforded. Space exploration to date has proved less dangerous than
>the arctic and high mountain exploration of the previous two
>centuries.

Several astronauts, including the former head of the NASA astronaut
office, John Young, have disputed this. NASA spent over $35 billion on the
Shuttle, yet the Shuttle didn't even have a drag chute for landing, until
after the Challenger accident. It's hard to argue, with a straight face,
that it was because NASA couldn't afford one.

>Some people are braver that Pickrell evidently thinks they ought to be.

Bravery has nothing to do with it. NASA granted itself more than 800
Criticality 1 (non-redundant) safety waivers on the Space Shuttle. No
safety waivers were allowed in the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, or Skyalb
programs. That's not because the Mercury, Gemini, or Apollo astronauts
were less brave.

--
The opinions expressed in this message are my own personal views
and do not reflect the official views of Microsoft Corporation.


dkn...@efn.org

unread,
Feb 11, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/11/97
to

Bill MacArthur says that the girl in "The Cold Equations" "was warned"
but didn't pay any attention. All the story tells us about this is that
there was a sign over the door, "UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL KEEP OUT!"

Damon

Scott A. Munro

unread,
Feb 12, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/12/97
to

Someone within the last few years wrote a fictional "response" to
Godwin's story called "The Cold Solutions." The solution the pilot
came up with is to hack various body parts off herself and the
stowaway and eject them, thus allowing both to live.
-----
Scott A. Munro http://www.nextdim.com/users/smunro/
Read my horror story "Immortal"
<http://tale.com/munro/imm-free.htm>
on the web at Mind's Eye Fiction <http://tale.com/>

New York Theosophical Society

unread,
Feb 12, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/12/97
to

John McCarthy (j...@Steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
: error, and that everyone ought to know that. Would _The

: Cold Equations_ have the same effect if it was set in a
: rowboat?

: Similar stories have been set in rowboats. Usually, the actions that
: lead to the sacrifice of lives can be fuzzed up a little.

A doctor, a lawyer, and an accountant were in shark-infested
waters in a rowboat. There was a shore in sight, but the rowboat was
sinking; it could not make it to shore with all three people on board.
The lawyer, seeing this, said, "You row to shore; I'll jump into the
water", and proceeded to do so. The doctor and accountant rowed the boat
to shore, and, much to their amazement, saw the lawyer swim safely to
shore, flanked by sharks on either side.

"Why didn't the sharks eat you?" asked the doctor, in surprise.

"Professional courtesy", said the lawyer.

John McCarthy

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

In article <5dqt3c$t...@news.microsoft.com> edwr...@microsoft.com (Edward Wright) writes:
>
> In article <JMC.97Fe...@Steam.stanford.edu>, j...@Steam.stanford.edu
> says...
>
> >Aircraft are subject to single-point failures. All it takes is one
> >bomb. The design of the Shuttle involved as much redundancy as could
> >be afforded. Space exploration to date has proved less dangerous than
> >the arctic and high mountain exploration of the previous two
> >centuries.
>
> Several astronauts, including the former head of the NASA astronaut
> office, John Young, have disputed this. NASA spent over $35 billion on the
> Shuttle, yet the Shuttle didn't even have a drag chute for landing, until
> after the Challenger accident. It's hard to argue, with a straight face,
> that it was because NASA couldn't afford one.
>
> >Some people are braver that Pickrell evidently thinks they ought to be.
>
> Bravery has nothing to do with it. NASA granted itself more than 800
> Criticality 1 (non-redundant) safety waivers on the Space Shuttle. No
> safety waivers were allowed in the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, or Skyalb
> programs. That's not because the Mercury, Gemini, or Apollo astronauts
> were less brave.

Do you seriously think NASA's safety waivers put astronauts in as much
danger as 17th thru early 20th century were? Scott and his entire
expedition to the South Pole perished - to take a 20th century
example.

Do you think John Young was claiming any such thing?
--
John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/
He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.


Cathy Mancus

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

In <JMC.97Fe...@Steam.stanford.edu>, j...@Steam.stanford.edu (John McCarthy) writes:
>Scott and his entire expedition to the South Pole perished - to take
>a 20th century example.

Only because he was grossly incompetent. We've already beaten
that subject to death.

--Cathy Mancus <man...@vnet.ibm.com>

FIDO

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

John McCarthy writes:

Scott and his entire expedition to the South Pole perished
- to take a 20th century example.

"Entire expedition"? Come now. Five who were the final assault
party. A monument to stupidity and hubris. Talk about safety
waivers ... Shackleton and Nansen wrote the ObBooks on polar
exploration.

FIDO

Zak Cramer

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to


>John McCarthy (j...@Steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
>: error, and that everyone ought to know that. Would _The
>: Cold Equations_ have the same effect if it was set in a
>: rowboat?

Perhaps it would. But "The Cold Equations" is interesting not only in
the point it makes about physical law being what it is whether we like

it or not, but also in that this becomes more and more an issue for us
the farther removed we are from the safe confines of our homes .......
..... those ancient Phonecians or Greeks that set out into a dark and
unknown sea were brave men, and so also will be those who will set
forth leaving this safe blue sphere of our human origins and voyage
into the vast deep. - Zak

Allen Thomson

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

In article <JMC.97Fe...@Steam.stanford.edu> j...@cs.Stanford.EDU writes:

[snip]

>
>Do you seriously think NASA's safety waivers put astronauts in as much

>danger as 17th thru early 20th century were? Scott and his entire


>expedition to the South Pole perished - to take a 20th century
>example.
>

>Do you think John Young was claiming any such thing?
>--
>John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
>http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/
>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Well, perhaps it would be useful to do, or at least think about,
arithmetic. If a person takes a trip on the Shuttle, that person
has about a 1% chance of dying during the trip. What was the chance
of dying during an expedition in the period you mention?

pat

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

In article <5dv4vo$l...@mufasa.harvard.edu>,
zcr...@warren.med.harvard.edu says...

Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
scenario. Obviously the cold equations must have been written
before Apollo 13. The simple physical study of the Apollo 13
accident was of an unsurvivable event. The CM had insufficient
power to survive, and the LEM had insufficient resources for 3 men.

now godwin would have one of the three get thrown overboard.
Gene krantz decided otherwise.

any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
is a joke. when a B-17 lost 2 engines, it was heading down.
the crew would dump everything to delay the inevitable long
enough to get over land.

Edward Wright

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

> > Bravery has nothing to do with it. NASA granted itself more than 800

> > Criticality 1 (non-redundant) safety waivers on the Space Shuttle. No
> > safety waivers were allowed in the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, or Skyalb
> > programs. That's not because the Mercury, Gemini, or Apollo astronauts
> > were less brave.

>Do you seriously think NASA's safety waivers put astronauts in as much


>danger as 17th thru early 20th century were? Scott and his entire
>expedition to the South Pole perished - to take a 20th century
>example.

That is irrelevent. Polar explorers -- the good ones, anyway -- did as much
careful planning as possible before the set out. Failure to do that is not
bravery, it's stupidity. Safety standards for space vehicles should be based
on how safe we can make them, at reasonable expense, with current
technology, not on what was acceptable to 17th Century explorers.

Besides, Shuttle astronauts are not explorers. Their mission is to boldy go
where Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, and Skylab have gone before. They are not
Charles Lindbergh. More like the people who crossed the Atlantic 30 years
after Lindbergh. But no one who crossed the Atlantic in the 1950s faced a
1/100 chance of death.

Steve Dirickson

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

p...@clark.net (pat) wrote:

>any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
>is a joke. when a B-17 lost 2 engines, it was heading down.
>the crew would dump everything to delay the inevitable long
>enough to get over land.

I don't intend to pick on this specific posting; this theme of "was it
*really really* necessary to space the stowaway?" has come up over and
over again in this thread (and the multitude that preceded it).

Aren't we kind of missing the point? This is a *story*, people! It is
not a drill scanario for space cadets, and it's not some type of
historical account being presented as a lesson--it's a tale, made up
by the author, and the events are simply not negotiable; this is the
way the author wrote it, and this is the way it is. If the story had
ended with
1) A brilliant solution that allowed both pilot and stowaway to
survive unscathed
2) The previously-mentioned "Cold Solutions" resolution of both
surviving, but less than intact
3) Both surviving, but at the cost of dumping the cargo
(critically-needed medical supplies as I recall, though it's been a
while)
4) Something else

then it wouldn't be the same story. It might be thoroughly enjoyable,
hailed as a masterpiece, or it might be a quickly-forgotten bit of
fluff, but it would not be *this* story, and this story is what the
author wrote.

Steve Dirickson WestWin Consulting
(360) 598-6111 sdir...@kpt.nuwc.navy.mil

Todd D. Ellner

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

In article <5e04fa$t...@news.microsoft.com>,::Do you seriously think NASA's safety waivers put astronauts in as much

::danger as 17th thru early 20th century were? Scott and his entire
::expedition to the South Pole perished - to take a 20th century
::example.
>That is irrelevent. Polar explorers -- the good ones, anyway -- did as much
>careful planning as possible before the set out. Failure to do that is not
>bravery, it's stupidity.

It is a pity that Scott was one of the stupid ones. It is even more of
a shame that history lionized him while villifying the real heroes like
Amundsen and Shackleton(sp?).

Todd
--
Todd Ellner | The man who never alters his opinion is like the
tel...@cs.pdx.edu | stagnant water and breeds Reptiles of the mind.
(503)557-1572 | --William Blake "The Marriage of Heaven and Hell"

dkn...@efn.org

unread,
Feb 13, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/13/97
to

John McCarthy wrote:
> The premise of _The Cold Equations_ was that all possible weight had
> been removed in order that the ship had a chance of bring the needed
> vaccine. There were no phone books.
>
> I can understand that people don't want a story to be based on that
> premise. I feel similarly about Anna Karenina. Tolstoy should have
> written the story so that Anna got psychiatric help in time.

"The Cold Equations," as many people have pointed out, is a cheesy story
because the text does not support its premises. If you add up the mass
of various superfluous things mentioned in the course of the story, it's
easy to show that the girl need not have been jettisoned. I won't give
the whole list here, but start with the pilot's weapon, the rulebook,
and the closet (stowaways, concealment of, Mark VI). :)

Damon

John McCarthy

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

In article <5dvbkl$l...@clarknet.clark.net> p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
>
> In article <5dv4vo$l...@mufasa.harvard.edu>,
> zcr...@warren.med.harvard.edu says...
> >
> >
> >
> >>John McCarthy (j...@Steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
> >>: error, and that everyone ought to know that. Would _The
> >>: Cold Equations_ have the same effect if it was set in a
> >>: rowboat?
> >
> >Perhaps it would. But "The Cold Equations" is interesting not only in
> >the point it makes about physical law being what it is whether we like
> >
> >it or not, but also in that this becomes more and more an issue for us
> >the farther removed we are from the safe confines of our homes .......
> >..... those ancient Phonecians or Greeks that set out into a dark and
> >unknown sea were brave men, and so also will be those who will set
> >forth leaving this safe blue sphere of our human origins and voyage
> >into the vast deep. - Zak
> >
> >
> >
>
> Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
> scenario. Obviously the cold equations must have been written
> before Apollo 13. The simple physical study of the Apollo 13
> accident was of an unsurvivable event. The CM had insufficient
> power to survive, and the LEM had insufficient resources for 3 men.
>
> now godwin would have one of the three get thrown overboard.
> Gene krantz decided otherwise.
>
> any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
> is a joke. when a B-17 lost 2 engines, it was heading down.
> the crew would dump everything to delay the inevitable long
> enough to get over land.
>

The premise of _The Cold Equations_ was that all possible weight had


been removed in order that the ship had a chance of bring the needed
vaccine. There were no phone books.

I can understand that people don't want a story to be based on that
premise. I feel similarly about Anna Karenina. Tolstoy should have
written the story so that Anna got psychiatric help in time.

Zak Cramer

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

p...@clark.net (pat) wrote:
>Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
>scenario.

Not always - or, at least, not yet.

The entry in The Encyclopedia of SF isn't full of details
(and I can't remember it very well) but I believe T. Godwin
died of some horrible disease ....

If we could ALWAYS alter the scenario, then no one on Earth would
be hungry, no one would die, and I wouldn't have to go to work every
day and waste my life on vacuous activities like reading usenet.

Still, though, I take your point - we should be optimists until we are

dead. It's not over till it's over.

- Zak

pat

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to
>In article <5dvbkl$l...@clarknet.clark.net> p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
> >
> > In article <5dv4vo$l...@mufasa.harvard.edu>,
> > zcr...@warren.med.harvard.edu says...
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >>John McCarthy (j...@Steam.stanford.edu) wrote:
> > >>: error, and that everyone ought to know that. Would _The
> > >>: Cold Equations_ have the same effect if it was set in a
> > >>: rowboat?
> > >
> > >Perhaps it would. But "The Cold Equations" is interesting not only
in
> > >the point it makes about physical law being what it is whether we
like
> > >
> > >it or not, but also in that this becomes more and more an issue for
us
> > >the farther removed we are from the safe confines of our homes
.......
> > >..... those ancient Phonecians or Greeks that set out into a dark
and
> > >unknown sea were brave men, and so also will be those who will set
> > >forth leaving this safe blue sphere of our human origins and voyage
> > >into the vast deep. - Zak
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> > Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
> > scenario. Obviously the cold equations must have been written
> > before Apollo 13. The simple physical study of the Apollo 13
> > accident was of an unsurvivable event. The CM had insufficient
> > power to survive, and the LEM had insufficient resources for 3 men.
> >
> > now godwin would have one of the three get thrown overboard.
> > Gene krantz decided otherwise.
> >
> > any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
> > is a joke. when a B-17 lost 2 engines, it was heading down.
> > the crew would dump everything to delay the inevitable long
> > enough to get over land.
> >
>
>The premise of _The Cold Equations_ was that all possible weight had
>been removed in order that the ship had a chance of bring the needed
>vaccine. There were no phone books.
>
>I can understand that people don't want a story to be based on that
>premise. I feel similarly about Anna Karenina. Tolstoy should have
>written the story so that Anna got psychiatric help in time.
>--
>John McCarthy, Computer Science Department, Stanford, CA 94305
>http://www-formal.stanford.edu/jmc/progress/
>He who refuses to do arithmetic is doomed to talk nonsense.
>


All possible weight? Gee that must mean Landing loads onthe
vehicle are far greater then takeoff loads.

One takes a saw or a torch and starts cutting away now un-needed
structure. That blaster is of course a good starting point.

Now limited life support is a much stronger case. X O2 on board,
the vehicle leaks at a certain rate, one consumes at a certain
rate. Now one can modify this by reducing O2 pressure, sealing off
areas, etc....

The basic nihilism of many SF writers is troubling to me.

pat

pat

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

In article <5e1ob0$r...@mufasa.harvard.edu>,
zcr...@warren.med.harvard.edu says...

>
>p...@clark.net (pat) wrote:
>>Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
>>scenario.
>
>Not always - or, at least, not yet.
>
>The entry in The Encyclopedia of SF isn't full of details
>(and I can't remember it very well) but I believe T. Godwin
>died of some horrible disease ....
>
>If we could ALWAYS alter the scenario, then no one on Earth would
>be hungry, no one would die, and I wouldn't have to go to work every
>day and waste my life on vacuous activities like reading usenet.
>
>Still, though, I take your point - we should be optimists until we are
>
>dead. It's not over till it's over.
>
> - Zak
>
>

I would point out professional pilots never panic during an
in-flight emergency. the Cockpit Voice Recorder tapes 99%
of the time show them deliberately trying procedures and
analyzing the problem until about a second before impact.

They usually keep working the controls until final impact.

Quitting is for losers.

pat


Cathy Mancus

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

>j...@Steam.stanford.edu says...


>>The premise of _The Cold Equations_ was that all possible weight had
>>been removed in order that the ship had a chance of bring the needed
>>vaccine.

In <5e239l$7...@clarknet.clark.net>, p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
>All possible weight? Gee that must mean Landing loads onthe
>vehicle are far greater then takeoff loads.

The vehicle in the story was a small craft "launched" in zero-gee
from a mother ship. It never handled takeoff loads.

Of course, this begs the question of whether you really want
to be routinely flying vehicles with so little margins.....

--Cathy Mancus <man...@vnet.ibm.com>

gram

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

pat (p...@clark.net) wrote:
:
: any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,

: is a joke. when a B-17 lost 2 engines, it was heading down.
: the crew would dump everything to delay the inevitable long
: enough to get over land.
:
A B-17 that lost two engines was was _designed_ to have a lot of
capacity for material that could be jettisoned, and the means to
dump it quickly and easily. The B stands for Bomber.

Ward Griffiths

Gregg Germain

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

Cathy Mancus (JHOLL4@) wrote:

: In <5e239l$7...@clarknet.clark.net>, p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
: >All possible weight? Gee that must mean Landing loads onthe
: >vehicle are far greater then takeoff loads.

: The vehicle in the story was a small craft "launched" in zero-gee
: from a mother ship. It never handled takeoff loads.

Um all it means to be launched in Zero G is that the loading
on the articles inside it was 1 G less than if it were launched from
earth.

I don't know what acceleration the ship had to get away from the
mother ship but THOSE are launch loads and therefore the articles
inside did handle a "takeoff" load.


--- Gregg
Saville
gger...@cfa.harvard.edu #29 Genie
Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics #1762 CRIS
Phone: (617) 496-7713 "A Mig at your six is better than
no Mig at all."

Cathy Mancus

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

In <3304b...@cfanews.harvard.edu>, gr...@ncc1701a.harvard.edu (Gregg Germain) writes:

>Cathy Mancus (JHOLL4@) wrote:
>> The vehicle in the story was a small craft "launched" in zero-gee
>> from a mother ship. It never handled takeoff loads.

> Um all it means to be launched in Zero G is that the loading
>on the articles inside it was 1 G less than if it were launched from

>Earth.

> I don't know what acceleration the ship had to get away from the
>mother ship but THOSE are launch loads and therefore the articles
>inside did handle a "takeoff" load.

Sorry, that's oversimplified. There is a reason that launchers
don't accelerate at 1.5 g from Earth; you would waste too much fuel
while deep in the gravity well. It is much more efficient to
accelerate rapidly. The ship that pulled away from the mother
ship could have used very low gee thrust, although I don't remember
the actual amount from the story.

Also, a launch from Earth requires supports that can handle
the loaded weight, extra fuel to handle the aerodynamic drag, etc,
etc. Compare the LM with the Saturn V and you'll see what I mean.

--Cathy Mancus <man...@vnet.ibm.com>

John Schilling

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

p...@clark.net (pat) writes:


>Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the

>scenario. Obviously the cold equations must have been written
>before Apollo 13. The simple physical study of the Apollo 13
>accident was of an unsurvivable event. The CM had insufficient
>power to survive, and the LEM had insufficient resources for 3 men.


And a "simple physical study" shows this?

Bull.

The physics governing human oxygen consumption are far from simple,
and indeed are not particularly amenable to analytical solution.
The rocket equation predicts with as much precision as you care
to ask for, how much propellant will be reqiuired to complete a
particular trip. There is no such equation for oxygen consumption;
certainly nothing along the order of "X men in Y hours consume Z
kilograms of oxygen".

There are statistical approximations. "X men in Y hours will with
99.99% confidence consume between Z1 and Z2 kilograms of oxygen".

And these approximations, applied to the circumstances of the Apollo
13 spacecraft and crew, resulted in a simple, physical *uncertainty*
regarding the survivability of the event. There were insufficient
resources to *guarantee* the survival of three men, but there is
a very large grey area between guaranteed survival and guaranteed
death by asphyxiation.


Apollo 13 was very much like the classic "lifeboat" story, and thus
a nearly absolute opposite of the scenario in _The Cold Equations_.
The former are characterized by a fundamental *un*certainty regarding
the outcome of various strategies, the latter by an absolute certainty.

Which is why Godwin chose propellant, rather than oxygen, as the
limiting factor.


>any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
>is a joke.


Fine. List for me the 100kg of disposable internal fittings in
a Cessna Skywagon modified for range and cargo. The kind of
"cargo ship" which, in the real world, might be used for, say,
carrying medical supplies to a remote outpost. Your local
general-aviation airport can probably set you up with an owner's
manual that itemizes the weight of every component, so it shouldn't
be too difficult a task.

And yes, there is at least one place in such an aircraft where a
stowaway could hide, even through a standard preflight inspection.

--
*John Schilling * "You can have Peace, *
*Member:AIAA,NRA,ACLU,SAS,LP * or you can have Freedom. *
*University of Southern California * Don't ever count on having both *
*Aerospace Engineering Department * at the same time." *
*schi...@spock.usc.edu * - Robert A. Heinlein *
*(213)-740-5311 or 747-2527 * Finger for PGP public key *

David M. Palmer

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
[trimming, and thereby losing all but the top level attribution]

>> > >the point it makes about physical law being what it is whether we like
>> > >it or not...

>> > Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
>> > scenario. ...

>> > any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
>> > is a joke....

>>
>>The premise of _The Cold Equations_ was that all possible weight had
>>been removed in order that the ship had a chance of bring the needed
>>vaccine. There were no phone books.

>All possible weight? Gee that must mean Landing loads onthe


>vehicle are far greater then takeoff loads.

Yes they were. The ship in question was a small ship launched
from a larger ship. It couldn't lift off from a planet under
its own power, so there's no reason to make it strong enough to.

>The basic nihilism of many SF writers is troubling to me.

Actually, the story was written in response to the prevailing Sci-Fi
style of the time, where against impossible odds, the hero pulls
out a miraculous save, sometimes using super-science*. The whole
point of the story is that, _sometimes_, you can't. One unhappy
ending out of thousands of stories should be troubling only because
of its rarity.

*After the villian had encased the three orphans and me in solid rock,
eight miles below the surface, with only three minutes worth of air,
things looked pretty grim. But I noticed that the cavity we were in
intersected a vein of spuzzumite which, as you know, breaks down in the
presence of electricity. I grabbed a comb and ran it through the
tousled mops of the three youngsters, and soon had enough static charge
to clear the way to safety.
--
David M. Palmer
dmpa...@clark.net
http://www.clark.net/pub/dmpalmer/

Robert Sneddon (SEE .SIG TO REPLY)

unread,
Feb 14, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/14/97
to

In article <5e0c93$a...@sirius.cs.pdx.edu>

tel...@cs.pdx.edu "Todd D. Ellner" writes:

>
> It is a pity that Scott was one of the stupid ones. It is even more of
> a shame that history lionized him while villifying the real heroes like
> Amundsen and Shackleton(sp?).
>

And the unsung heroes, like Dr. Ray, from the Orkneys, who mapped and
surveyed massive tracts of Canada over a ten year period for the Hudson
Bay Company, and only lost one man, an Esquimaux who drowned. He
wasn't a self-publicist, or articulate, or titled, just a working stiff.
His big mistake that cost him dear was to bring back evidence of the fate
of an "expedition" lead by a titled idiot who died to the last man -
telling of "civilised" people and the cannibalism that was their last
desperate act before their extinction. He was vilified as a credulous
fool, who would take the word of a native, a savage, about their hero's
fate (the "savage" had traded valuable meat for useless (but identifiable)
trinkets to the lost expedition, and tried to give them directions,
which they ignored).

Going into the Unknown can kill you. Space travel is no different
from Polar or naval travel used to be, before powerful steel-hulled
ships, helicopters, satellite navigation systems etc were introduced.
It is dangerous, and AFAIK still totally a volunteer occupation.
The risks are minimised, and they can be reduced further as
knowledge is gained, but as this happens, the Unknown is rolled back.
This always seems to expose more Unknown...

--
*** SPAM BLOCKED ADDRESS *** To reply, remove the string "_nospam_" from
the address above. If you don't, mail will bounce and I'll never see it.
This is done to prevent spammers from junk-emailing me.
Robert (nojay) Sneddon


pat

unread,
Feb 15, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/15/97
to

In article <5e31ir$9...@spock.usc.edu>, schi...@spock.usc.edu says...

>
>p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
>
>
>>Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
>>scenario. Obviously the cold equations must have been written
>>before Apollo 13. The simple physical study of the Apollo 13
>>accident was of an unsurvivable event. The CM had insufficient
>>power to survive, and the LEM had insufficient resources for 3 men.
>
>
>And a "simple physical study" shows this?

sure. The LEM was designed to support 2 men for 48 hours,
not 3 men for 96. Power, water, Co2 absorption were all
insufficient.

If you went by the book, ensign savik.



>
>Bull.
>
>The physics governing human oxygen consumption are far from simple,
>and indeed are not particularly amenable to analytical solution.
>The rocket equation predicts with as much precision as you care
>to ask for, how much propellant will be reqiuired to complete a
>particular trip. There is no such equation for oxygen consumption;
>certainly nothing along the order of "X men in Y hours consume Z
>kilograms of oxygen".
>
>There are statistical approximations. "X men in Y hours will with
>99.99% confidence consume between Z1 and Z2 kilograms of oxygen".
>
>And these approximations, applied to the circumstances of the Apollo
>13 spacecraft and crew, resulted in a simple, physical *uncertainty*
>regarding the survivability of the event. There were insufficient
>resources to *guarantee* the survival of three men, but there is
>a very large grey area between guaranteed survival and guaranteed
>death by asphyxiation.
>
>
>Apollo 13 was very much like the classic "lifeboat" story, and thus
>a nearly absolute opposite of the scenario in _The Cold Equations_.
>The former are characterized by a fundamental *un*certainty regarding
>the outcome of various strategies, the latter by an absolute certainty.
>
>Which is why Godwin chose propellant, rather than oxygen, as the
>limiting factor.

and even propellant while governed by the rocket equation assumes a
certain fixed mass.

>
>
>>any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,

>>is a joke.
>
>
>Fine. List for me the 100kg of disposable internal fittings in
>a Cessna Skywagon modified for range and cargo. The kind of
>"cargo ship" which, in the real world, might be used for, say,
>carrying medical supplies to a remote outpost. Your local
>general-aviation airport can probably set you up with an owner's
>manual that itemizes the weight of every component, so it shouldn't
>be too difficult a task.
>
>And yes, there is at least one place in such an aircraft where a
>stowaway could hide, even through a standard preflight inspection.

Ah, he get's chicken, Internal fittings. Real men will not be limited
to this.

Start with.

1) Seats.
2) Co-pilot controls (Pedals, rudders, yoke, linkages.)
3) Radio Nav stack and com radio stack.
4) all manuals, logbooks, food,water.
5) Fire extinguisher
6) O2 bottles.
7) engine instrumentation.
8) flight instruments except ASI,ALtimeter, climb rate gauge,compass.
9) carpeting
10) garments.

-------

now if you are a real macho stud, and not some whining, crying,
quitter, you get out on the wing and take off the
flaps, drives and linkages. Speed brakes if they are existent.
if that's not enough drop the wheels and landing gear struts.

That is assuming you are macho enough.

the goal is to get the cargo there, the aircraft is disposable.
a belly landing maybe ugly, but it is an acceptable option,

If you are up to the challenge.

------------------


Of course it's far easier to sit there reading magazines and whining
about how hard life is in a university then actually doing the hard
things.

pat

pat

unread,
Feb 15, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/15/97
to

In article <5e3cct$l...@clark.net>, dmpa...@clark.net says...

>
>p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
>[trimming, and thereby losing all but the top level attribution]
>>> > >the point it makes about physical law being what it is whether we
like
>>> > >it or not...
>>> > Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
>>> > scenario. ...

>>> > any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
>>> > is a joke....
>>>
>>>The premise of _The Cold Equations_ was that all possible weight had
>>>been removed in order that the ship had a chance of bring the needed
>>>vaccine. There were no phone books.
>
>>All possible weight? Gee that must mean Landing loads onthe
>>vehicle are far greater then takeoff loads.
>
>Yes they were. The ship in question was a small ship launched
>from a larger ship. It couldn't lift off from a planet under
>its own power, so there's no reason to make it strong enough to.
>

Typical Narrow-minded, failure seeking Aero-space engineer.
Okay, so this is a shuttle, What does it do once it makes
planetary landfall, turn into a gazebo?

when it gasses up, loads cargo and leaves the planet, it faces
a much larger takeoff load.

And in this case, the vehicle is landing, so it's burning fuel
and losing weight and stress during the landing.

I know most aero folks sort of prefer failure, but this is
ridiculous.

>>The basic nihilism of many SF writers is troubling to me.
>
>Actually, the story was written in response to the prevailing Sci-Fi
>style of the time, where against impossible odds, the hero pulls
>out a miraculous save, sometimes using super-science*. The whole
>point of the story is that, _sometimes_, you can't. One unhappy
>ending out of thousands of stories should be troubling only because
>of its rarity.
>

Most of human endeavour is survival against the odds.

>*After the villian had encased the three orphans and me in solid rock,
>eight miles below the surface, with only three minutes worth of air,
>things looked pretty grim. But I noticed that the cavity we were in
>intersected a vein of spuzzumite which, as you know, breaks down in the
>presence of electricity. I grabbed a comb and ran it through the
>tousled mops of the three youngsters, and soon had enough static charge
>to clear the way to safety.

Hey if you like kids reading, fine. I'll stick to the more serious
stuff.

David Anderman

unread,
Feb 15, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/15/97
to

In article someone says...

>>>The basic nihilism of many SF writers is troubling to me.


What is more troubling to me is that we are a lot more interested in SF and
what to call Star Trek fans than getting out into the Real World to open the
space frontier.

How about a discussion on:

What are the real policy issues that confront space entrepreneurs today;

and

what can *we* do to resolve those issues?


Otherwise, we'll not only still be discussing SF and Star Trek on this board
in 30 years, but we'll be arguing about whose fault it was that the space
frontier was never opened.

DAvid Anderman

Jim Kingdon

unread,
Feb 15, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/15/97
to

> What are the real policy issues that confront space entrepreneurs today;

Well, depends on the entrepreneurs, but I'd probably say that the
biggest issues confronting entrepreneurs are not government policy at
all, but just the usual difficulties in starting a business. As
nearly as I can tell, LunaCorp and Casey Aerospace are going to
succeed or fail based on whether they can get their act together, not
based on anything external to those companies themselves.

> Otherwise, we'll not only still be discussing SF and Star Trek on this board
> in 30 years, but we'll be arguing about whose fault it was that the space
> frontier was never opened.

Oh we do that already :-).

-Mammel,L.H.

unread,
Feb 15, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/15/97
to

In article <5dvbkl$l...@clarknet.clark.net>, pat <p...@clark.net> wrote:

>Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the

>scenario. Obviously the cold equations must have been written
>before Apollo 13. The simple physical study of the Apollo 13
>accident was of an unsurvivable event. The CM had insufficient
>power to survive, and the LEM had insufficient resources for 3 men.

I actually remember this issue coming up during the coverage
of the events. All the news people were in a tizzy over the
amount of oxygen. A news conference was held and the spokesman
started intoning their plans etc., when the press erupted
from the floor, "WHAT ABOUT OXYGEN? DO THEY HAVE ENOUGH
OXYGEN?" Yes, they did. "HOW COULD THEY?" The amount in
the lunar module included allowance for two purges of the
cabin during their lunar excursions. "OHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

Also, FYI, sometime before Apollo 11, LEM was dropped in favor
of LM ( Lunar Excursion Module -> Lunar Module ) but
it continued to be referred to orally as the "Lem", and
LEM survives by virtue of its lexicographical utility in
crossword puzzles.

Lew Mammel, Jr.

Bill MacArthur

unread,
Feb 16, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/16/97
to

p...@clark.net (pat) wrote:
>In article <5e31ir$9...@spock.usc.edu>, schi...@spock.usc.edu says...

>>Fine. List for me the 100kg of disposable internal fittings in


>>a Cessna Skywagon modified for range and cargo. The kind of
>>"cargo ship" which, in the real world, might be used for, say,
>>carrying medical supplies to a remote outpost. Your local
>>general-aviation airport can probably set you up with an owner's
>>manual that itemizes the weight of every component, so it shouldn't
>>be too difficult a task.
>>
>>And yes, there is at least one place in such an aircraft where a
>>stowaway could hide, even through a standard preflight inspection.
>
>Ah, he get's chicken, Internal fittings. Real men will not be limited
>to this.
>
>Start with.
>
>1) Seats.
>2) Co-pilot controls (Pedals, rudders, yoke, linkages.)
>3) Radio Nav stack and com radio stack.
>4) all manuals, logbooks, food,water.
>5) Fire extinguisher
>6) O2 bottles.
>7) engine instrumentation.
>8) flight instruments except ASI,ALtimeter, climb rate gauge,compass.
>9) carpeting
>10) garments.
>

I presume that you are talking about a Cessna 180 and not the finely CE
ship. You have built some assumptions in here:

1) You have the tools to remove the seats.
2) You have the tools to remove the co-pilot controls and not mess
anything up.
4) Manuals etc. would weigh but a few pounds unless you have some long
term provisions.
5) Fire extinguisher- OK.
6) O2- OK.
7) Tools to remove engine instrumentation.
8) " " " flight ".
9) " " " carpeting.
10) OK but the big question is Who flies the airplane while you tear it
apart?

If you had the tools to rip out all this stuff, you would probably save
more weight throwing the tools overboard.


le...@netcom.com

unread,
Feb 16, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/16/97
to

In article <5e3duh$l...@clarknet.clark.net>,

p...@clark.net (pat) wrote:
>
> In article <5e31ir$9...@spock.usc.edu>, schi...@spock.usc.edu says...
> >
> >p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
> >
> >
> >>Physical laws are what they are, but we still can alter the
> >>scenario. Obviously the cold equations must have been written
> >>before Apollo 13. The simple physical study of the Apollo 13
> >>accident was of an unsurvivable event. The CM had insufficient
> >>power to survive, and the LEM had insufficient resources for 3 men.
> >
> >


Not quite sure what you mean by this. The idea behind the rocket
equation is that fuel is burned, the total mass of the vehicle goes down,
that changes the amount of fuel you need to burn, etc. Mass of
propellant is not a constant.

The other thing is, it can be exactly calculated. There aren't any of
the uncertainties associated with something like oxygen consumption.
Thus, the characters in TCE know just how far they can run with the
girl's added mass on board.

>

> >
> >
> >>any cargo ship without 100 Kg of disposable internal fittings,
> >>is a joke.
> >
> >

If these fittings are disposable, then why are they even there in the
first place? Especially when extra mass means burning more fuel, which
means burning more money. Anyway 1) how do you tear them out and 2) if
they're not truly superfluous, (for instance, something like backups),
are you sure you want to fly without them?

> >Fine. List for me the 100kg of disposable internal fittings in
> >a Cessna Skywagon modified for range and cargo. The kind of
> >"cargo ship" which, in the real world, might be used for, say,
> >carrying medical supplies to a remote outpost. Your local
> >general-aviation airport can probably set you up with an owner's
> >manual that itemizes the weight of every component, so it shouldn't
> >be too difficult a task.
> >
> >And yes, there is at least one place in such an aircraft where a
> >stowaway could hide, even through a standard preflight inspection.
>
> Ah, he get's chicken, Internal fittings. Real men will not be limited
> to this.
>
> Start with.
>
> 1) Seats.
> 2) Co-pilot controls (Pedals, rudders, yoke, linkages.)
> 3) Radio Nav stack and com radio stack.
> 4) all manuals, logbooks, food,water.
> 5) Fire extinguisher
> 6) O2 bottles.
> 7) engine instrumentation.
> 8) flight instruments except ASI,ALtimeter, climb rate gauge,compass.
> 9) carpeting
> 10) garments.
>

> -------

Again, how do you tear all this stuff out? Also remember that you're
running against a time limit.

>
> now if you are a real macho stud, and not some whining, crying,
> quitter, you get out on the wing and take off the
> flaps, drives and linkages. Speed brakes if they are existent.
> if that's not enough drop the wheels and landing gear struts.
>
> That is assuming you are macho enough.
>
> the goal is to get the cargo there, the aircraft is disposable.
> a belly landing maybe ugly, but it is an acceptable option,
>
> If you are up to the challenge.
>

And belly landings are a good way to die.

Why even bother tearing all of this stuff out? Why not just stuff that
girl out the airlock? Isn't it a little foolish to risk the lives of the
pilot and all those miners by gutting his ship just to save the life of
one human being?

Anyway, what's macho go to do with it? Machismo or whatever is a poor
substitute for courage; for instance, if the girl had said, "Well, you
could gut this ship, trashing backup instrumentation and cutting away
pieces of the hull, drastically reducing the chances of either of us
making it and in the process dooming those poor miners, or I can walk out
that airlock. I think I'll walk out that airlock."

Now that's a lot more admirable than machismo.


> ------------------
>
> Of course it's far easier to sit there reading magazines and whining
> about how hard life is in a university then actually doing the hard
> things.
>
> pat

-------------------==== Posted via Deja News ====-----------------------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Post to Usenet

pat

unread,
Feb 16, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/16/97
to

In article <E5o61...@news.uwindsor.ca>, bil...@uwindsor.ca says...

>
>p...@clark.net (pat) wrote:
>>In article <5e31ir$9...@spock.usc.edu>, schi...@spock.usc.edu says...
>
>>>Fine. List for me the 100kg of disposable internal fittings in
>>>a Cessna Skywagon modified for range and cargo. The kind of
>>>"cargo ship" which, in the real world, might be used for, say,
>>>carrying medical supplies to a remote outpost. Your local
>>>general-aviation airport can probably set you up with an owner's
>>>manual that itemizes the weight of every component, so it shouldn't
>>>be too difficult a task.
>>>
>>>And yes, there is at least one place in such an aircraft where a
>>>stowaway could hide, even through a standard preflight inspection.
>>
>>Ah, he get's chicken, Internal fittings. Real men will not be
limited
>>to this.
>>
>>Start with.
>>
>>1) Seats.
>>2) Co-pilot controls (Pedals, rudders, yoke, linkages.)
>>3) Radio Nav stack and com radio stack.
>>4) all manuals, logbooks, food,water.
>>5) Fire extinguisher
>>6) O2 bottles.
>>7) engine instrumentation.
>>8) flight instruments except ASI,ALtimeter, climb rate gauge,compass.
>>9) carpeting
>>10) garments.
>>
>I presume that you are talking about a Cessna 180 and not the finely CE
>ship. You have built some assumptions in here:
>
>1) You have the tools to remove the seats.
>2) You have the tools to remove the co-pilot controls and not mess
>anything up.
>4) Manuals etc. would weigh but a few pounds unless you have some long
>term provisions.
>5) Fire extinguisher- OK.
>6) O2- OK.
>7) Tools to remove engine instrumentation.
>8) " " " flight ".
>9) " " " carpeting.
>10) OK but the big question is Who flies the airplane while you tear it
>apart?
>
>If you had the tools to rip out all this stuff, you would probably save
>more weight throwing the tools overboard.
>

A swiss army knife, a Leatherman and some desperation???

Sounds like all the tools I need. Now for somethign big like a
landing gear strut that may require something larger, or some
more creative approaches, but internal light fittings???

I think it's reasonable.

pat

-Mammel,L.H.

unread,
Feb 16, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/16/97
to

In article <8561229...@dejanews.com>, <le...@netcom.com> wrote:
>
>Not quite sure what you mean by this. The idea behind the rocket
>equation is that fuel is burned, the total mass of the vehicle goes down,
>that changes the amount of fuel you need to burn, etc. Mass of
>propellant is not a constant.
>
>The other thing is, it can be exactly calculated. There aren't any of
>the uncertainties associated with something like oxygen consumption.
>Thus, the characters in TCE know just how far they can run with the
>girl's added mass on board.

The idea that the fuel requirement is constant and independent
of the chosen trajectory is a dynamical absurdity. In the story
the pilot deviates considerably from the planned course
"to prolong that ultimate end". If the course had been planned
for minimal fuel usage, this sentimental act would be fatal -
much more surely than a minor weight deviation. And Wait! He
stops DECELERATING and it will take LONGER to get there?

The operative rules here are literary, fantastical, not
physical. The "ultimate end" of the story determines all
the rationalizations, not the other way around.

Lew Mammel, Jr.

Michael P. Walsh

unread,
Feb 16, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/16/97
to

David Anderman wrote:
>
>
>
> How about a discussion on:
>
> What are the real policy issues that confront space entrepreneurs today;
>
> and
>
> what can *we* do to resolve those issues?
> ---
---
---
I think that the main policy issue that needs to be explored is what
regulation problems will be faced by space entrepreneurs who are
trying to accomplish commercial activities in space.

The fact has to be faced that while the government may not be able
to produce low cost access to space, it certainly has the power
to prevent anyone else from doing it.

Mike Walsh

paschal

unread,
Feb 16, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/16/97
to

On Sun, 16 Feb 1997 le...@netcom.com wrote:

> Anyway, what's macho go to do with it? Machismo or whatever is a poor
> substitute for courage; for instance, if the girl had said, "Well, you
> could gut this ship, trashing backup instrumentation and cutting away
> pieces of the hull, drastically reducing the chances of either of us
> making it and in the process dooming those poor miners, or I can walk out
> that airlock. I think I'll walk out that airlock."
>
> Now that's a lot more admirable than machismo.

Given this improbable ship to start with, the above is one alternative
scenario that I would accept. At least it suggests the triumph of the
human spirit over selfishness, fear, etc.

But: machismo is still an extremely valuable quality in men, and in the
world. It, along with other qualities, has often aided men in
accomplishing the "impossible."

-Paschal


Doug Hendrix

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97
to

dav...@cwo.com (David Anderman) wrote:

>How about a discussion on:

>What are the real policy issues that confront space entrepreneurs today;

>and

>what can *we* do to resolve those issues?

That's a good idea and may I suggest that we look forward rather than
back.

I think one big issue that confronts space entrepreneurs today is the
identification of a product that can be produced in space, in the near
term, that has sufficient commercial value to attract investors.
Maybe mining asteroids and the like are realistic commercial ventures
but payback prospects are too long to attract serious investors. What
is needed is a product that has great commercial appeal and can be
produced in Space in the 5 years. Five years and the prospect of
50-100% ROI and as an investor and I'm interested. Ten years requires
a MUCH greater ROI potential. Greater than 10 years....No one will be
interested. Find the product that fits the above description and a
toehold will be possible for space entrepreneurs.

yon lew

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97
to

l...@ihgp167e.ih.lucent.com (-Mammel,L.H.) writes:

>In article <8561229...@dejanews.com>, <le...@netcom.com> wrote:
>>

>>Not quite sure what you mean by this. The idea behind the rocket
>>equation is that fuel is burned, the total mass of the vehicle goes down,
>>that changes the amount of fuel you need to burn, etc. Mass of
>>propellant is not a constant.
>>
>>The other thing is, it can be exactly calculated. There aren't any of
>>the uncertainties associated with something like oxygen consumption.
>>Thus, the characters in TCE know just how far they can run with the
>>girl's added mass on board.

>The idea that the fuel requirement is constant and independent


>of the chosen trajectory is a dynamical absurdity. In the story
>the pilot deviates considerably from the planned course
>"to prolong that ultimate end". If the course had been planned
>for minimal fuel usage, this sentimental act would be fatal -
>much more surely than a minor weight deviation. And Wait! He
>stops DECELERATING and it will take LONGER to get there?


It's been a while since I've read the story, but as I recall the shuttle
DID have a slight amount of surplus fuel for use in emergencies. When
the pilot lets the girl stay on board for a while before tossing her out,
it's this fuel which is being consumed.

Secondly, even if the pilot doesn't point the nose of his ship in a
different direction, just accelerating or decelerating will change his
orbit. I don't remember if he was travelling between stars or planets or
what, but you can easily set up a scenario where the above would be
true, especially if the guy has to deal with more than one big gravity
well in his path.


>The operative rules here are literary, fantastical, not
>physical. The "ultimate end" of the story determines all
>the rationalizations, not the other way around.

>Lew Mammel, Jr.


I would have to disagree here. While this story continues to excite
controversy, it almost always centers around the "Couldn't he have tossed
some stuff out?" question. I don't know that anyone's successfully
undermined the basis for the story on the grounds of it being simply
physically impossible.

-Mammel,L.H.

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97
to

In article <lewyE5q...@netcom.com>, yon lew <le...@netcom.com> wrote:

>l...@ihgp167e.ih.lucent.com (-Mammel,L.H.) writes:
>
>>The idea that the fuel requirement is constant and independent
>>of the chosen trajectory is a dynamical absurdity. In the story
>>the pilot deviates considerably from the planned course
>>"to prolong that ultimate end". If the course had been planned
>>for minimal fuel usage, this sentimental act would be fatal -
>>much more surely than a minor weight deviation. And Wait! He
>>stops DECELERATING and it will take LONGER to get there?
>
>
>It's been a while since I've read the story, but as I recall the shuttle
>DID have a slight amount of surplus fuel for use in emergencies. When
>the pilot lets the girl stay on board for a while before tossing her out,
>it's this fuel which is being consumed.

OK, belay my "And wait! ..." remark.

It does mention a "meager surplus of fuel to compensate for
unfavorable conditions within the atmosphere." He reduces
deceleration to save fuel, right - so this defers the fatal
moment, although it would presumably shorten the trip. On the
other hand he's already been decelerating at a presumably moderate
rate for an hour without unduly wasting fuel, so we're getting
kind of a confused picture here.

Anyway, how could this delay of an hour fail to completely wreck
the carefully planned trajectory and drastically affect
the fuel requirements? A severe technical flaw. It would have
made more sense if the EDS ( Emergency Dispatch Ship ) was
still coasting before a planned burn.


>Secondly, even if the pilot doesn't point the nose of his ship in a
>different direction, just accelerating or decelerating will change his
>orbit. I don't remember if he was travelling between stars or planets or
>what, but you can easily set up a scenario where the above would be
>true, especially if the guy has to deal with more than one big gravity
>well in his path.

It's a straight "drop" onto the planet. Come on! you want to
talk rocket science and you don't know if it's "stars or
planets or what" ? Thanks for making my point about rules
fantastical!

I reiterate, the setting of the story is the fifties SF
mythos, not reality. BTW, I think that's why the ship isn't
coasting - a residual Aristotelianism whereby motion entails
some sort of propulsion, whether decelerative or otherwise.

Lew Mammel, Jr.

Steve Patterson

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97
to

In article <5e4kcc$d...@clarknet.clark.net>, p...@clark.net (pat) says:
>
>In article <5e3cct$l...@clark.net>, dmpa...@clark.net says...
>>
>>p...@clark.net (pat) writes:
>>
>>>All possible weight? Gee that must mean Landing loads onthe
>>>vehicle are far greater then takeoff loads.
>>
>>Yes they were. The ship in question was a small ship launched
>>from a larger ship. It couldn't lift off from a planet under
>>its own power, so there's no reason to make it strong enough to.
>
>Typical Narrow-minded, failure seeking Aero-space engineer.
>Okay, so this is a shuttle, What does it do once it makes
>planetary landfall, turn into a gazebo?

Typical short-sighted, fault-seeking critic. :) It isn't a shuttle.
It's an Emergency Dispatch Ship, designed to be as light as possible.
It probably operates on the Dorito(tm) principle; launch all you want,
we'll just make more. (There are *enormous* weight-savings when you
make something disposable.)

>when it gasses up, loads cargo and leaves the planet, it faces
>a much larger takeoff load.

No, it doesn't, because it never takes off again. The pilot would
probably be retrieved by a reusable shuttle launched by a later-arriving
FTL transport, either a scheduled supply run or a more-fully equipped
relief ship depending upon the nature of the emergency.

[example of super-science tale deleted.]


>
>Hey if you like kids reading, fine. I'll stick to the more serious
>stuff.

You might want to re-read that post more carefully, and check whether it
was *endorsing* or *denigrating* super-science tales.

@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
Note: My "from:" address has been altered to foil mailbots.
Please use the corrected address appearing below.
@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@@
Steven J. Patterson spatt...@wwdc.com
W.O.R.L.D.'S....S..L..O..W..E..S..T....W...R...I...T...E...R
"Men may move mountains, but ideas move men."
-- M.N. Vorkosigan, per L.M. Bujold

Jim Kingdon

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97
to

> I think that the main policy issue that needs to be explored is what
> regulation problems will be faced by space entrepreneurs who are
> trying to accomplish commercial activities in space.

It depends on the activity. For comsats and most other payloads which
can launch on existing launchers (or new launchers which can cope with
the existing regulatory framework), the regulatory environment is well
known. For many kinds of deals with the Russians (e.g. Pepsi Mir ad),
the US government is not an issue.

I'll agree that the regulatory environment is an issue. But I think
it is not as large an issue as many people assume.

Jim Kingdon

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97
to

> I think one big issue that confronts space entrepreneurs today is the
> identification of a product that can be produced in space, in the near
> term, that has sufficient commercial value to attract investors.

Absolutely right. But requiring the product to be produced in
space is thinking too narrowly. For example:

LunaCorp--today they try to put together Desert Trek, Robots in
Cyberspace or other projects involving terrestrial rovers; if that
works out then they can build on that to do the same thing with rovers
to the moon.

Casey Aerospace--today they put together a plan for microgravity
aircraft tourism; if that works out then they can move on to
suborbital or orbital tourism.

KSC Visitor center--in 1996 they spent a bunch of private money to
upgrade their facility to attract more tourists; if that works out
then they can move on to deals with LunaCorp, video from Mir, or other
ways in which a theme park might fund spaceflight.

I have lots more ideas on matters such as these; see
http://www.cyclic.com/~kingdon/space/markets.html

yon lew

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97
to

Newsgroups: rec.arts.books,rec.arts.sf.misc,rec.arts.sf.written,sci.space.policy
Subject: Re: The Cold Equations
References: <5dgi63$n...@news-central.tiac.net> <8561229...@dejanews.com> <5e871d$e...@ssbunews.ih.lucent.com> <lewyE5q...@netcom.com> <5e8k9r$f...@ssbunews.ih.lucent.com>

l...@ihgp167e.ih.lucent.com (-Mammel,L.H.) writes:

Hmm, I guess I should have been more specific here. First off, just let
me say that it's been a long time since I've read this story. From what
I recall, it wasn't too specific on a lot of the technical details,
leaving you free to assume stuff. I assumed that the guy knew what he
was doing and that the extra amount of fuel he has was sizable. After
all, if he only had a tiny amount of extra fuel he wouldn't have had time
to talk to the girl; he would have had to shoot her immediately and throw
her body out the hatch. I also assumed that they plotted a new orbit
because as I pointed out before it's impossible for him to maintain the
same orbit once he stops decelerating. Given that, it's entirely
conceivable that in his new orbit it'll take him longer to get where he's
going.

So, hell, if we're going to go out on a limb let's just go all the way
out and hypothesize as to what the characters in Tom Godwin's story were
_really_ thinking. Our pilot has to navigate through several big gravity
wells, (if he's making just a planet drop, then the planet's got a couple
of big-sized moons that are messing with his orbit). Time is of the
essence, (I don't remember, but weren't these miners sick with some
disease or some such?), so the navigators use their computers to plot a
course that takes a minimal amount of time, but it requires constant
deceleration and constant fuel burning to do it. Alas, our pilot finds
this girl on board, so he kills the engines to give them some extra
time. Unfortunately, this kicks them into another orbit. The fuel he
would have burned to constantly decelerate his ship and keep him on a
minimal-time flight path will now be used to guide him along another,
slower approach.


>>Secondly, even if the pilot doesn't point the nose of his ship in a
>>different direction, just accelerating or decelerating will change his
>>orbit. I don't remember if he was travelling between stars or planets or
>>what, but you can easily set up a scenario where the above would be
>>true, especially if the guy has to deal with more than one big gravity
>>well in his path.

>It's a straight "drop" onto the planet. Come on! you want to
>talk rocket science and you don't know if it's "stars or
>planets or what" ? Thanks for making my point about rules
>fantastical!

Obviously, I was just joking about that interstellar travel part. Those
miners' grandkids' grandkids would have perished long before the shuttle
landed.

Also, I don't remember if it was a drop onto a planet, or from how far
out. If it's from way out, you can imagine the effect any nearby planets
would have on this guy's course. If it's from relatively close, you
could have the same effect from a couple of big moons.

Or hell, maybe instead of fuel he's going to slingshot off the sun or a
moon or something to guide himself in.

>I reiterate, the setting of the story is the fifties SF
>mythos, not reality. BTW, I think that's why the ship isn't
>coasting - a residual Aristotelianism whereby motion entails
>some sort of propulsion, whether decelerative or otherwise.

>Lew Mammel, Jr.


See above for some groundless but basically sound speculation as to why
he wasn't coasting.


David Thomas Richard Given

unread,
Feb 17, 1997, 3:00:00 AM2/17/97