NASA May Or May Not Be Working With Ireland
Updated: NASA research alliance with Ireland: no announcement due this week, Silicon Republic
“While reports had been circulating in the media today claiming that space agency NASA had selected Ireland as its first international research partner, it appears that NASA is not set to make an official announcement on this scientific alliance this week.”
US space agency Nasa selects Republic as first international research partner, Irish Times
“Following two years of negotiations, the initiative will be officially announced tomorrow at Trinity College by Nasa administrator Gen Charles Bolden. Tim Quigley, a retired naval officer and former commander of Moffet Airfield at the Ames base in California, was the go-between who pushed to ensure that this State leads the project.”
U.S. Embassy in Dublin Tweets: #AskCharlie A Question, earlier post
“NASA PAO says that Bolden is “in the UK now for Farnborough and is going [to Ireland] tomorrow.”
There is nothing like having a research partner that is dead broke. I hope they will spend our money carefully. On second thought maybe they will spend it better than we will. 🙁
NASA’s signing up alliances from left to right but can’t seem to develop their programs from the “drawing boards” to reality. Where’s our ingenuity we were once proud of,where’s our focus,our leadership? All we’re doing is making too much talk and not enough action. We need new leadership!
NASA has leadership from left to right but can’t seem to develop their leadership away from politics and agendas and toward long-term plans relevant to and beneficial to the Nation.
Ingenuity has a choice, it can chase windmills or it can pursue solutions for genuine needs.
A given focus may through the lens be sharp, but in the bright light of day may simply burn a hole through the paper.
A good leader will find the path to his success. A great leader will show you the path to your success.
A good leader will take steps to guarantee his own career longevity. A great leader will take steps to guarantee your career longevity.
Which type of leader do you work for?
Every year you witness $18 Billion dollars worth of talk and action. What’s needed is $18 Billion dollars of useful results, useful results, not just for NASA, but for the Nation.
A fundamental problem with NASA resides within its Charter. The Charter charges NASA with the responsibility for science, research, and technology development but only within a technology readiness level construct. The Charter fails to require that the science, research and technology must possess practical and useful value and utility relevant to the needs and economic necessities of the Nation.
If NASA created no value, zero value, would a dollar of budget be justified? Every individual in NASA should look in the mirror; is the work you perform creating a genuinely valuable result? Not a result just for your satisfaction, but a result others would find valuable? If your outputs have zero value to others, you are living on borrowed time.
To survive, NASA must “prove its worth”. The production of 10,000 volumes of peer reviewed science paper over 5 decades, while it may hold potential or pragmatically hold nothing, fails to “prove the worth” of the agency unless it can be shown that the content in those paper has been put to good use.
” The Charter fails to require that the science, research and technology
must possess practical and useful value and utility relevant to the
needs and economic necessities of the Nation.”
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And it shouldn’t. Basic research and letting researchers follow questions and paths that have no obvious benefit is how true innovation is developed. The fact that often this innovation is not evident for a generation or two does not mean it has no value.
We need to start thinking long term in this country instead of requiring immediate economic/technological magic for every dollar spent.
Requiring immediate value relevant to the needs and economic necessities of the Nation sounds nice but in reality is a flawed strategy that stifles innovation and leads to a stock market like strategy where the companies do nothing but try and satisfy their investors’ short term monetary gain.
Asking NASA to “prove its worth” makes some sense but only if you are talking time scales of generations, not presidential administrations. And the criteria must not be solely that of wealth production. And “needs of the nation” is not a criteria, it’s a nebulous label that changes depending on who you talk to.
We need long term strategy and clarity of description on why the long term strategy is the approach.
Here is whar R.R. Wilson, Director of Fermi Lab said to Sen. Pastore in 1969 concerning the value of Fermi Lab:
“In that sense, this new knowledge has all to do with honor and country but it has nothing to do directly with defending our country except to help make it worth defending.”