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Originally posted by Uryoces
How is creating a big magnetic ring in the dirt more important that two men scratching in the dirt on the moon? Will it help us create better fuel cells? Nope. The space program, and a company in Vancouver B.C. called Ballard Power Systems is seeing to that.
Planes with morphing wings? That seems to require advances in materials. Now, I wonder, which program is involved in materials like that? Will accelerating protons and antiprotons bring us any insight into this?
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Uryoces really doesn't have insight into science. Ballard Power Systems is simply applying what had long since been learned by basic research so many decades previously.
Maybe I should step back and explain differences between basic research and application research. Bell Labs in its creative day was basic research. Application research was then conducted by Western Electric, et al to develop products based upon basic research. Classic science history - when basic and applied research is done simultaneously, then progress stops.
Ballard Power Systems is only application research. They are not doing the breakthrough research. They only made a major step forwared in fuel cell development (application research) AND are now being surpassed by other application research centers. None of this proves a super collider unnecessary.
Concepts of superconductivity apparently are not understood. We so little understand the inner workings of superconductivity that we cannot even predict what can and can not be a superconductor - and why. Major breakthroughs included the BCS theory that explained something called phonons (no not photons). But again, to understand how these forces work, we need data that only a super collider could have provided. Concepts including how strong forces, weak forces, etc all work, are interrelated, created, and controlled.
Again Uryoces confuses application science (application of known superconductors and their proven abilities) with basic research (learning how and why superconductivity works).
But this in his post I have not a clue. How will putting two men on the moon scratching for water make breakthroughs in fuel cell technology? What are they going to find - magic slippers? A geni?
Apparently Uryoces is using the myth that the space program resulted in numerous breakthrough technologies. In reality, the space program was only a consumer of products that were already marketed or developed for other purposes. If Uryoces was right, then the 8080 microprocessor was a direct result of the space program. In fact that propaganda was promoted in about 1970. Now for reality. The 8080 microprocessor was an existing technology also used by the space program and by other big budget programs such as the Minuteman missile program. What created the 8080 and it predecessors? Trying to make a calculator. There it is. Calculator development - not a space program - should be encouraged because it results in major technological breakthroughs.
If Uryoces was correct, then disk drives also were created by the Minuteman missile program. After all, critical to the guidance system was a big disk drive in the top of that nuclear missile. Therefore the cold war is responsible for creating disk drives.
Reality - a space program will not result in better fuel cells.
We cannot even get a launch every few months but a few hundred miles to the top of earth's atmosphere. How does Uryoces expect that we supply two men on the moon every month? We don't even have enough rocket power to maintain the ISS? Where is the massive extra power coming from to go to the moon every month - so that two men can scratch the moon for water? Even Soyus cannot supply enough material to keep two men alive in the ISS? Where is this rocket large enough to supply two men every month on the moon?
Uryoces - you were only insulted if you are emotionally attached to your conclusions. I read not one personal attack on you - not even close. Not a single reason to discuss blood. But the word blood says to me you are emotionally attached to your conclusions when you should be logically attached. I read a severe shortage of basic science knowledge in your posts. First learn how basic particle research applies to previously posted science breakthroughs. You have confused application research with sub-atomic particle research. You don't appreciate how important particle research has becoming even to new materials and technology tools. Even that head on the gigahertz disk drive comes from work in particle physics - things learned from smashing sub-atomic particles together.
Tell me about strained silicon - a new concept in IC development. Were these concepts developed from men trying to stay alive in the ISS - or from fundamental science learned from plasma and sub-atomic particle physics?
If we are to produce better fuel cells, the technology will come only from particle physics. Why platinum and paladium work as they do - sub-atomic physics. Things learn from smashing atoms into pieces. Creating a big magnetic ring in the dirt IS that important even to fuel cell research - as to superconductivity - as to faster computers (and I am not talking about quantum computers) - as to greater data storage - as to new materials that are faster, stronger, lighter, etc. No space station or men romantically scratching for moon water is going to discover those breakthrough technologies.
The ISS has no scientific reason to exist. It has no monetary reason to exist. It has become a big white elephant because it has lost its only reason to exist. And its existance comes at the expense of mankind advancements in basic research. Big bucks does not mean big results. But spending big bucks only because of romantic ideas can starve mankind of fundamental science breakthroughs. Without understanding even the difference between basic research and application research, then we, the public, permit enemies of science to control science. We needed that super collider. It got killed by the ISS whose price has since skyrocketed by a factor of 10. And I now suspect super collider also got killed because the common man did not have a clue as to it's importance.