Newt promises a permanent moonbase by the end of his second term

[mhaze]

You have? Where?

In Newt's example that you quoted he talked about offering a $10 billion prize for an endeavor estimated to cost $450 billion.

Who would ever spend 45 times the value of a prize in order to win that prize?

X prize, teams spent more than 100M. Prize was 10M.

Orteig, teams spent 400K. Prize was 25K.

I used a multiplier of 10x based on these facts. Historically a winning team spends something like 2.5x the prize money they win.

As for your claim that "the endeavor would cost 450B", this you can only substantiate by looking at Newt's specific definitions of what the winning the prize would entail.

By no means is it the case that on a prize offered, there would be competitors, or a winner.

Many government programs yield positive ROI. In fact other than social security and military related spending, most government spending has a positive ROI.

Taking money from the NASA budget and handing it out as a prize is still a subsidy, you know the very thing you called me a “liar” for calling you on.

Correctly, yes. Take the example of the government having a lottery with prizes. The participants subsidize the government - that is shown by the net profit to the government on the operation. And that's the case here. Or did you not notice? It's very simple. Take the 50x economic effect on 1B, eg, 50B. Take 18-23% of that as tax revenue. Rounding, that's 10B cash in to the government for $1B outlay IF AND ONLY IF there was a winner.

Again you show your utter ignorance of the actual facts of Newt's proposal. But continue making things up, it's amusing.

The part where he said there "will be" instead of there "might be" if someone in private industry actually does it.

Saying "will be" means he plans on seeing to it that it's done. And since he can't control private industry the only way to do that would be for the government to do it. And since he plans on gutting the government, one wonders how he plans on accomplishing that.

That's well reasoned. But it's clear that the thrust of the entire series of prizes he proposed (by no means was it just the moon thing) was for private industry. All I can tell you is that "will be" is or seems to be the extent of his faith in private industry.

 

[johnny karate]

X prize, teams spent more than 100M. Prize was 10M.

Orteig, teams spent 400K. Prize was 25K.

I used a multiplier of 10x based on these facts. Historically a winning team spends something like 2.5x the prize money they win.

$10 billion x 2.5 = $25 billion

Projected cost of endeavor = $450 billion

Seems to be a bit of a shortfall there.

As for your claim that "the endeavor would cost 450B", this you can only substantiate by looking at Newt's specific definitions of what the winning the prize would entail.

First of all, it's not my claim, it's Newt's. These are the numbers he provided to support his idea that you quoted to defend that idea.

Secondly, Newt lays out pretty clearly what winning the prize would entail. It's right there in the section you quoted:

You set up prizes – for example, I forget what the Bush administration estimate was, but it was something like $450 billion to get to Mars with a manned mission. So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion.

To win the $10 billion, you would need to "get to Mars with a manned mission". An endeavor which Newt offers an estimated cost of $450 billion.

So back to my original question: Who is going to spend $450 billion to win $10 billion?

By no means is it the case that on a prize offered, there would be competitors, or a winner.

And in light of that reality, it seems odd Newt would make this declaration:

By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon, and it will be American

How can he make such a definitive statement regarding an event he would have no control over?

 

[lomiller]

The participants subsidize the government - that is shown by the net profit to the government on the operation.

You need to stop inventing your own definitions for words.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

As for your claim that "the endeavor would cost 450B", this you can only substantiate by looking at Newt's specific definitions of what the winning the prize would entail.

Nonsense. It's a reasonable (if low) estimate of the total cost of establishing a permanent moon base. That's what Newt promised. If he wants to redefine this to be something much less grandiose, then he's abusing the language.

And again, his tax proposal would result in a reduction of federal revenue of $1.2 trillion in 2015 alone. Where's he going to get even the tens of billions to pay for this prize that can somehow magically encourage private investors to spend 10 times the amount of the prize?

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

How can he make such a definitive statement regarding an event he would have no control over?

Same way he can make the ludicrous tax proposal he is basing his campaign on: he's Newt!

 

[mhaze]

You need to stop inventing your own definitions for words.

And you need to stop lying, and stop the lame efforts at covering it up. Here's what you claim is a subsidy?

So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion. If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

$....Newt lays out pretty clearly what winning the prize would entail. It's right there in the section you quoted:


To win the $10 billion, you would need to "get to Mars with a manned mission". An endeavor which Newt offers an estimated cost of $450 billion.

So back to my original question: Who is going to spend $450 billion to win $10 billion? ....

See the bolded statement above. Then explain to me why I should care about your point of view, if the downside cost is zero? Put up 12 prizes, some produce results, some don't. I can't imagine why private industry would do things at "the cost that NASA would charge". Frankly, I don't think NASA could do it at any price.

...his tax proposal would result in a reduction of federal revenue of $1.2 trillion in 2015 alone. Where's he going to get even the tens of billions to pay for this prize that can somehow magically encourage private investors to spend 10 times the amount of the prize?

Magically? So it was magic behind the X prize? Thanks for informing us of that. Since the X prize worked, the founders of it win the JREF prize.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion. If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

And you consider this to be a legitimate implementation of Newt's promise to have a permanent moon base by the end of his second term?

"By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon, and it will be American."

Heck, a candidate could promise a cure for AIDS, cancer, and indeed an immortality elixir within 8 years by that way of thinking.

 

[mhaze]

And you consider this to be a legitimate implementation of Newt's promise to have a permanent moon base by the end of his second term?

"By the end of my second term, we will have the first permanent base on the moon, and it will be American."

Heck, a candidate could promise a cure for AIDS, cancer, and indeed an immortality elixir within 8 years by that way of thinking.

No. It's a statement he made concerning Mars. Why not read a bit and get your facts right instead of thinking that I care about correcting your opinions?

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Magically? So it was magic behind the X prize? Thanks for informing us of that. Since the X prize worked, the founders of it win the JREF prize.

Someone won the X prize, but it didn't establish a permanent moon base. I'm not sure of this relationship.

Does it follow that any prize you offer, no matter how ludicrous will necessarily be won by private enterprise?

Heck, can we promise the end of world hunger by offering a $10 billion prize? What about safe, controlled, room temperature nuclear fusion?

Indeed, I think there is something magical about the thinking that says offering a $10 billion prize for something that will cost at least an order of magnitude more than that to achieve is a reasonable fulfillment of the promise to achieve that something within 8 years.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

No. It's a statement he made concerning Mars. Why not read a bit and get your facts right instead of thinking that I care about correcting your opinions?

Read the thread title. Or do you admit that you're just going off topic?

What facts do I have wrong?

 

[mhaze]

Someone won the X prize, but it didn't establish a permanent moon base. I'm not sure of this relationship.

Does it follow that any prize you offer, no matter how ludicrous will necessarily be won by private enterprise?

Heck, can we promise the end of world hunger by offering a $10 billion prize? What about safe, controlled, room temperature nuclear fusion?

Indeed, I think there is something magical about the thinking that says offering a $10 billion prize for something that will cost at least an order of magnitude more than that to achieve is a reasonable fulfillment of the promise to achieve that something within 8 years.

Actually, you have the basic idea right there. These kinds of prizes are nothing new - they are intended to stretch current vision and capability by an order of magnitude.

Some pay off big, some don't.

 

[mhaze]

Read the thread title. Or do you admit that you're just going off topic?

What facts do I have wrong?

So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion. If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

...which you latched onto, was concerning a Mars trip. It was though, another example of a prize and the use of private enterprise.

And let's get to a very important point. You've claimed that only magic could make these prizes work, so Peter Diaminis of the X Prize group should have already won the JREF prize.

Yes. Or No.

 

[lomiller]

And you need to stop lying, and stop the lame efforts at covering it up. Here's what you claim is a subsidy?

So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion.

IOW Government gives them money to encourage some business activity they would not otherwise have undertaken. Yes, that is a absolutely subsidy, have you not bothered to find out what the word means yet?


BTW "save $440 billion" only applies if you assume it would have happened anyway, which is pretty stupid in this case.

 

[lomiller]

If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

In which there is no moon base by the end of Newt's second term and his campaign promise has been broken. The is the inevitable result of course, this promise never had any chance of being kept, it was pure political pandering with a heaping helping of crazy from the get go.

 

[mhaze]

In which there is no moon base by the end of Newt's second term and his campaign promise has been broken. The is the inevitable result of course, this promise never had any chance of being kept, it was pure political pandering with a heaping helping of crazy from the get go.

Really? He qualified his campaign promise thus:

So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion. If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

Also. Did you think nobody would notice your ignoring the trivially easy answer to your heap of squirrel crap?

It's very simple. Take the 50x economic effect on 1B, eg, 50B. Take 18-23% of that as tax revenue. Rounding, that's 10B cash in to the government for $1B outlay IF AND ONLY IF there was a winner.

Here are your earlier comments which show almost total ignorance of the subject of the thread along with your lies about my attitudes and opinions.

Note that once again, we see mhaze favouring massive government intervention in a market imply because some Republican has made it part of their platform. This continues with the pattern where mhaze will support any form of market intervention as long as it’s proposed by Republicans and oppose any form of action to remove externalities from a market when it’s proposed by Democrats.

You want to create a massive subsidy for the production of He3 (or you simply want nationalized production of He3 so it can be handed out as a subsidy to a preferred industry) in an attempt to make an otherwise unattractive business appealing to investors. Both forms are subsidies and therefore market interventions and as others have pointed out both are bad business decisions that would do nothing but waste massive amounts of taxpayer money.

That'd be the massively expensive moon base you are foolishly trying to argue for...​

Funny. They don't seem to have much relation to the facts.

Aw....

Did you not do your homework?

 

[BenBurch]

The best model for getting to the moon in this way is the Transcontinental Railroad. It did not pay it own way for many, many years, and was built way too fast, in order to get bonus payments from the government. In fact they went so fast that it almost all had to be totally rebuilt in only a few years. And there were some massive payments into the Union Pacific and Central Pacific.

$16,000 to $48,000 a mile depending on difficulty, and huge tracts of land that the railroad then sold to settlers who then generated traffic for the railroad with their produce.

In other words, the U S Government made it nearly impossible for Union Pacific and Central Pacific to fail.

You'd need to do something like that if you wanted a moon base from private companies.

 

[mhaze]

I see your analogy in terms of risk mitigation yielding short term success in a venture, but disagree for fairly simple reasons. The likely outcome in terms of technology spin offs in this concept of he3 mining would be extremely advanced robotics.

Robotic ventures are extremely cheap compared to sending meat in meatspaces into outer space.

There is no singular outcome here such as the building of a transcontinental railroad. There is instead, prospecting and mining exploration, pilot plant testing, gradual development of reliable methods for production of he3 on the moon.

That's hundreds of independent robots doing jobs in a mission oriented sense, in a bare minimum setup. Think of it in terms of hundreds of systems on another planet, each roughly similar to, and with Earth bound support systems equal to say each of the Martian rovers. This does not translate to massive launch costs and fixed human habitats as either the primary thrust or the main cost drivers.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

Really? He qualified his campaign promise thus:

Again, you consider it to be a legitimate rephrasing of what he said? I don't. I don't think it's so much that he "qualified" his campaign promise as that he admitted he almost certainly can't fulfill it, but at least it won't cost us anything. (Unlike his bizarro tax plan!)

 

[johnny karate]

So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion. If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

See the bolded statement above. Then explain to me why I should care about your point of view, if the downside cost is zero?

It's not a matter of you caring, but rather whether or not you expect to be taken seriously. So far, the answer to that question seems to be a resounding "No".

You have two serious problems with this ridiculous notion you've chosen to defend.

First, it's reconciling Newt's promise to have a moon base by 2020 with his supposed plan to fund it by offering a prize to the first person to do it, which you yourself acknowledged is a method by which it is impossible to predict success.

Second, it's making the math work on this "prize" idea. Newt expects someone to undertake this endeavor at a significant financial loss with no indication of who would be in a position to do it, or an explanation why they would do it.

In short, Newt made a stupid campaign promise which you then stupidly tried to defend with an even stupider plan Newt pulled out of his backside.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion. If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

...which you latched onto, was concerning a Mars trip. It was though, another example of a prize and the use of private enterprise.

First off, please start indicating when you're quoting text with quotation marks or the quote tag. (It's confusing when you use italics in that unconventional way.)

Here's the quote from the speech in question:

So let’s go back to how to do it. I would want 10% of the NASA budget set aside for prize money. Lindberg flies to Paris for $25,000. You set up prizes – for example, I forget what the Bush administration estimate was, but it was something like $450 billion to get to Mars with a manned mission. So let’s put up $10 billion. And if somebody figures it out, we save $440 billion. If they don’t figure it out, it didn’t cost us anything.

I think he's admitting that it won't be done, or at least that his promise isn't likely to be fulfilled.

The promises came from earlier in the speech:

By the end of my second term we will have the first permanent base on the Moon, and it will be American [applause].

We will have commercial near-Earth activities that include science, tourism, and manufacturing, and are designed to create a robust industry precisely on the model that was developed by the airlines in the 1930s, because it is in our interest to acquire so much experience in space that we clearly have a capacity that the Chinese and the Russians will never come anywhere close to matching [applause].

And by the end of 2020 we will have the first continuous propulsion system in space capable of getting to Mars in a remarkably short time, because I am sick of being told we have to be timid, and I’m sick of being told we have to be limited to technologies that are 50 years old [applause].

So again, do you consider a prize that is likely to fail to accomplish what Newt is promising to be a reasonable proposal to keep his promises?

Or is it your claim that he's not offering a plan to achieve the thing he's promised, and that the plan is for something else (something other than a permanent moon base or a rocket with a continuous propulsion system capable of reaching Mars in a very short time)?

Most of us consider the "plan" to be connected to the promises. But if it's not, then none of your comments are actually on the topic of this thread, are they?

And let's get to a very important point. You've claimed that only magic could make these prizes work, so Peter Diaminis of the X Prize group should have already won the JREF prize.

Yes. Or No/

No. You completely mischaracterized what I said. I said it's magical thinking to think that these prizes MUST work no matter how little the prize is in comparison to the cost of winning it.

Do you think a $10 billion prize for solving world hunger, curing AIDS or developing an immortality elixir is a good idea? Yes or no.