The Planetary Report, March/April 1982)
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Board of Directors CARL SAGAN BRUCE MURRAY In place of our regular Letters to the Editor, we are printing a letter written by Planetary Society member Vice President, President James Gotlieb to Congressman Sidney Yates, along with Mr, Yates 's reply, Mr. Yates is a member of the Director, Laboratory Professor of for Planetary Studies. Planetary Science, House Appropriations Committee, which sets the funding levels for the various agencies of the government. Cornell University California Institute Mr. Gotlieb's letter is an example of the power of the individual to "lobby" Congress,- Ed. of Technology LOUIS FRIEOMAN Executive Director HENRY TANNER Assistant Treasurer, JOSEPH RYAN California Institute DEAR CONGRESSMAN YATES: O'Melveny & Myers of Technology I am writing to ask you to use your position on the House Appropriations Committee to support continued funding for the NASA planetary program, Board of Advisors The 1970's saw an unprecedented growth in humanity's understanding of our place in the universe, OIANE AKERMAN JAMES MICHENER Central to this remarkable extension of knowledge was NASA's planetary program. During the present poet and author author period of reorienting budget priorities, NASA has not been immune, Crucial programs have been cancelled ISAAC ASIMOV PHILIP MORRISON or delayed. The Venus Orbiting Imaging Radar (VOIR) , the American spacecraft for the International author Institute Professor, Massachusetts Solar Polar Mission, the mission to Halley's Comet, and the research program on the Search for RICHARO BERENDZEN Institute of Technology President, Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETO have all been cancelled, American University PAUL NEWMAN The reason for these cuts is obvious. The space shuttle program is consuming an ever-larger JACQUES BLAMDNT actor proportion of NASA's budget. I have no quibble with the space shuttle per se, It is an extremely valuable Chief Scientist, BERNARD M. OLIVER investment which will revolutionize space exploration. The problem is that NASA is footing the entire bill Centre National Vice President, Spatiales, for a project that will be used for military projects more than half the time, While these may be legitimate d'~tudes Research and Develop France ment, Hewlett-Packard projects for a space vehicle, the budgetary arrangements are forcing the poor civilian cousin (NASA) RAY BRADBURY Corporation to subsidize its wealthier relative in the Pentagon-a relative who, like Croesus, already has more money poet and author ROALD Z. SAGDEEV than he can prudently spend. This arrangement is ridiculous, unfair and just plain bad public policy, JOHNNY CARSON Director, Institute for The curtailment of the planetary program has at least three negative effects: entertainer Cosmic Research, Academy of Sciences NORMAN COUSINS of the USSR 1) We will know less about ourselves and our place in the universe, On the level of pure knowledge editor and author we will be far poorer. HARRISON SCHMITT FRANK ORAKE U.S. Senator, New Mexico 2) Budget cuts mean personnel cuts and persoimel cuts mean fewer positions for young astronomers, Director , National astrophysicists, planetary biologists and others, This means that space science will lose many of the Astronomy and ADLAI E. STEVENSON, III Ionosphere Center former U.S. Senator, Il linois finest minds of this generation-the scientists who would otherwise have formed the human capital LEE A. DUBRIDGE LEWIS THOMAS for future space exploration, former presidential President, 3) Space exploration is one highly visible, relatively inexpensive, and very productive undertaking science advisor Memorial Sloan which can unite our divided planet. The stars stir everyone's imagination and the exchange of JOHN GARDNER Kettering Cancer Center founder, Common Cause scientific information enhances communication between otherwise antagonistic countries. No JAMES VAN ALLEN SHIRLEY M. HUFSTEDLER Professor of Physics, other activity can so clearly reinforce the fundamental truth that before we are American, Russian, educator and jurist University of Iowa Chinese or Tanzanian, we are human beings on Earth who must "dress and keep" our garden if any of us are to survive. Loss of the planetary perspective, which only an active space program The Planetary ReJJort is published six times yearly' can provide, makes our parochial conflicts loom larger than they actually are, thereby increasing at the editorial offices of The Planetary Society, selfishness, misunderstanding and the likelihood of war. 110 S. Euclid Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91101, Editor, Charlene M. Anderson; Shifting a portion of the shuttle's budget to the Department of Defense, or making the Pentagon Technical Editor, James D. Burke; pay its own way, would make more money available for NASA's planetary program, thereby increasing Art Director, Barbara Smith. our understanding and our chances for survival. Viewpoints expressed in columns or editorials are thbse of the authors and do not necessarily Please support NASA's planetary program. represent positions of The Planetary Society, its officers or advisors, JAMES GOTLlEB, Chicago, Illinois Copyright ©1982 by The Planetary Society, DEAR MR. GOTLlEB: Thank you very much for your letter regarding NASA's planetary program. Your views are thoughtful and very well stated. I am impressed by the force and eloquence of your COVER: Mars was photographed by the Viking spacecraft on their approaches arguments, As you may know, the NASA budget is within the jurisdiction of the HUD and Independent in 1976. Two orbiters and two landers Agencies subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee, You make a number of telling points, surveyed and sampled the red planet, particularly concerning the responsibility of the Pentagon to pay for military space programs, and I returning data on its weather, geology intend to pass your views along to my colleagues on the HUO-Independent Agencies subcommittee, and lack of biology. I appreciate your concern-and your taking the time to express it so vividly. PfiOTO: PLANETARY IMAGE FACILITY, JPLlNASA SIDNEY R. YATES, Member of Congress , maging systems on spacecraft serve the structure of Saturn's rings, the vol as extensions for our eyes, and in a canos on 10, and the dynamic circula sense they allow us to journey along tion patterns in the vast storm system to new vantage points and to partici that we used to think of simply as a pate directly in the exploration of new giant red spot on the disk of Jupiter. worlds. These systems have now pro The idea that a spacecraft system can vided us with many remarkable space act as a robot eye is a common one, pictures of Earth and its Moon, and but the corresponding acoustical con with close-up views of the craters on cept-that a remote recorder can cap Mercury, the clouds and surface of ture sounds from space - is still Venus, and the varied terrain of Mars relatively unfamiliar. We tend to think as well as its satellites. The Pioneer and of space as a complete vacuum, and Voyager flybys of Jupiter and Saturn we also think of sounds only in terms delivered astounding pictures of enor of pressure variations in a gas. Thus, at mously complex and beautiful plane first glance, it would appear that sounds tary systems, and the images could not develop above the dense themselves contained completely new atmosphere. While this straightforward information about many important reasoning is correct for acoustic sig by Frederick L Scarf phenomena. The pictures told us about nals that could be heard by the human The Pioneer Venus Orbiter reached the shrouded planet In December, 1978 Scientists expect the spacecraft to continue to transmit data until its orbit decays, sometime In 1992. The plasma wave instrument, resembling a ' rabbIt ears" television antenna, protrudes from the right side of Pioneer as portrayed here. This instrument has returned much Information on the Interaction of Venus and the solar wind. Figure I ear, it turns out that spacecraft systems Earth's magnetic field, but the plasma called plasma wave instruments really in space makes the waves travel rela do record space sounds using electric tively slowly. Moreover, the wave speed or magnetic sensors in place of ordi actually depends on the frequency, so nary microphones. that the higher-frequency components The equipment for a plasma wave move out more rapidly. Thus, a detec investigation is quite simple. The elec tor on the ground in the opposite tric sensor can be a single length of hemisphere receives the high wire similar to a car radio antenna, or frequency tones first and the signals a V-shaped set of wires similar to the with lower frequencies arrive later, rabbit ears or' dipoles used to receive creating a whistle with continuously television signals. The magnetic sen descending pitch. sor is a loop or coil of wire, and the The analysis of whistler propagation electronics unit is basically a high provides valuable information about fidelity audio amplifier whose output the distribution of plasma in the region goes to the spacecraft tape recorder or controlled by the Earth's magnetic field to the data transmitter. In essence, the (the magnetosphere), and when it customary plasma wave investigation became possible to send scientific resembles a simple portable cassette instruments into orbit on spacecraft, it Figure 2 recorder with a car radio antenna con was natural to try to perform some nected to the microphone input plug. wave measurements in space. The first We listen to the audio frequency sig opportunity came