Anybody want to leave the planet? No I'm serious.

[Lonnie]

Originally Posted by Rather Dashing

Going to Disneyworld costs a good deal of money, but it's not more expensive than, say, driving into the bad part of town and punching people indiscriminatingly, a fairly cheap activity. There are tons of things that cost a great deal of money. High-end art auctions, black tie charity events, flying in a private jet, renting or owning a limo, buying a relatively large house/mansion, etc, and yet nobody questions them based on their safety. This is because this is how much value people see in the thing. While I'm sure safety considerations take up some amount of the cost, as they do with any form of high-speed transportation(cars, airplanes, boats, jet-skis, etc), a lot of it also has to do with R&D, materials, labor(they need at least two pilots good enough to fly spaceships, I doubt this is cheap), marketing, etc. Besides, isn't that a GOOD thing? Would you prefer a CHEAP spacecraft that DIDN'T do a great number of checks to be sure everything was go before they took off?

Let's be a bit generous and say 600 people have gone into space. 18 people have died during space missions. In all, that is a 3% death rate. This puts it behind MANY causes of death per person, including things within the home such as Carbon Monoxide poisoning or things considered relatively safe like riding bicycles.

See, there are certain activities that people see as "especially dangerous". These include things like skydiving and suba, as these activities have a high cost of failure. The thing is that, due to those, the precautions made, deaths by skydiving are less than those by skiing or being struck by lightning.

Making shit up and then saying "No matter what FACTS you bring to the table, WHAT I SAY IS RIGHT" only makes you come off as ignorant and arrogant about being ignorant. I can say "KEVIN BACON WAS *NOT* IN FOOTLOOSE, AND NO MATTER WHAT YOU TRY AND PROVE, HE WAS NOT EVER INVOLVED IN THAT PRODUCTION", but it comes off as ridiculous to anyone else who takes even a cursory glance at actual facts.


Take off has taken seven people. Re-entry has killed 7 people. 3 died while in space due to decompression. 1 died in a crash after re-entry. Unless you count the crash after re-entry, they're exactly equally dangerous. If you do count it, the greater danger based on previous deaths is statistically insignificant.

So you don't beleive its dangerous???? thats all I'm asking. You're telling me you would have absolutely no worries going into space yeh?

Have you actually checked out the spaceship that people are paying $200,000 to travel in?

What about if things do go wrong? What then? all i read on that website was hey do you wanna fly to space? Then give us a $20,000 deposit.

Edit-I'm gunna laugh if you go on the trip and you run into trouble on board.

[Scnew]

I am glad more people don't think like you, Lonnie, or technology would never advance anywhere. What if we didn't have airplanes because everyone fretted over the possible risks? What if we didn't have cars or boats?

"You want to do WHAT? Go across the OCEAN? What if that boat thing gets a leak!?"

[Rather Dashing]

Originally Posted by Lonnie

So you don't beleive its dangerous???? thats all I'm asking. You're telling me you would have absolutely no worries going into space yeh?

Do you have worries when you get in a car? Because a major issue in that vehicle is likely going to turn out fatal as well. But to answer your question with an answer rather than a question, yes, if safety was the only concern, I'd feel perfectly comfortable riding on a Virgin Galactic "Founder" mission.

Have you actually checked out the spaceship that people are paying $200,000 to travel in?

Quite a deal moreso than I check out commercial airplane models before climbing aboard a normal Delta flight. I know that it is the direct successor to SpaceShipOne, which made 18 successful flights, 17 of them manned. I know that it has performed four successful crewed test flights, and testing is exceeding expectations. I know that Virgin Galactic's entire commercial space flight future, an industry into which Virgin has sunk an INSANE amount of money with the hope of large returns, depends on these first 100 "Founder" flights going smoothly.

What about if things do go wrong? What then? all i read on that website was hey do you wanna fly to space? Then give us a $20,000 deposit.

You know, I went online to reserve a ticket once. All I read on that website was "Hey, do you wanna fly to Tokyo? Then give us a $965 deposit."

If something goes wrong, things might stabilize. Worst case scenario, you die. Just like worse case scenarios for commercial airlines, cars, trains, scuba, skiing, rollerskating, skateboarding, walking down the street, and staying at home. The main difference here is that going into space comes with heavily accounted-for risks.

Something isn't dangerous only because it makes you feel scared. We're supposed to learn this lesson when we're young, when we realize that turning the light off in our bedroom does not actually attract monsters, or when we realize that we can use proper balance to keep ourselves from falling when riding a bicycle.

Edit-I'm gunna laugh if you go on the trip and you run into trouble on board.

So, this wasn't just a comment that happened kind of happened spontaneously and in the background of your mind. No, you thought this up afterwards, immediately decided that the idea that my own death would be hilarious was so good and added so much to your original post that you had to actually add it in after the fact.

...I have nothing else to say to that.

[JedExodus]

When I bought Star Trek on DVD it offered 5% off one of these flights. Cheers guys

[Alcoremortis]

Originally Posted by JedExodus

When I bought Star Trek on DVD it offered 5% off one of these flights. Cheers guys

Do the coupons stack? I'm thinking of buying a lot of Star Trek DVDs...

[Lonnie]

Originally Posted by Scnew

I am glad more people don't think like you, Lonnie, or technology would never advance anywhere. What if we didn't have airplanes because everyone fretted over the possible risks? What if we didn't have cars or boats?

"You want to do WHAT? Go across the OCEAN? What if that boat thing gets a leak!?"

LOL.

Originally Posted by Rather Dashing

Do you have worries when you get in a car? Because a major issue in that vehicle is likely going to turn out fatal as well. But to answer your question with an answer rather than a question, yes, if safety was the only concern, I'd feel perfectly comfortable riding on a Virgin Galactic "Founder" mission.


Quite a deal moreso than I check out commercial airplane models before climbing aboard a normal Delta flight. I know that it is the direct successor to SpaceShipOne, which made 18 successful flights, 17 of them manned. I know that it has performed four successful crewed test flights, and testing is exceeding expectations. I know that Virgin Galactic's entire commercial space flight future, an industry into which Virgin has sunk an INSANE amount of money with the hope of large returns, depends on these first 100 "Founder" flights going smoothly.


You know, I went online to reserve a ticket once. All I read on that website was "Hey, do you wanna fly to Tokyo? Then give us a $965 deposit."

If something goes wrong, things might stabilize. Worst case scenario, you die. Just like worse case scenarios for commercial airlines, cars, trains, scuba, skiing, rollerskating, skateboarding, walking down the street, and staying at home. The main difference here is that going into space comes with heavily accounted-for risks.

Something isn't dangerous only because it makes you feel scared. We're supposed to learn this lesson when we're young, when we realize that turning the light off in our bedroom does not actually attract monsters, or when we realize that we can use proper balance to keep ourselves from falling when riding a bicycle.


So, this wasn't just a comment that happened kind of happened spontaneously and in the background of your mind. No, you thought this up afterwards, immediately decided that the idea that my own death would be hilarious was so good and added so much to your original post that you had to actually add it in after the fact.

...I have nothing else to say to that.

No, I don't want you to die Rather Dashing, I was just being a dick.

Well I never knew about all the test flights, I really haven't heard much about it, just the thought of space travel makes me think of all those rockets that took off and blew up/crashed with people on them.

How does the thing take off...its like a rocket too yeh? Then lands like a plane once it reaches earths surface?