Flying pig or just a pizza?
After reading your tech reporting on page 12, issue 84, I must ask: why do Australian government bodies and motoring associations think they can do it better than Google and Tesla who have already spent billions on developing and testing the autonomous car? With many deaths already reported using this technology we are also facing the possibility of having flying pizzas splatting our windscreens and causing further accidents. I just don’t understand the haste in adopting some technologies when the tech giants can’t guarantee that hackers won’t cause havoc already seen in health care and communications systems worldwide.
I don’t wish to seem a Luddite but am concerned for the future based on past events as technologies can be sometimes more prestigious and other times more harmful in the wrong hands than beneficial to the mainstream. The newly formed Australian Space Agency is planning to send holiday makers to the moon. Why are we spending billions of dollars on this fantasy when millions of Australians are struggling to pay their energy bills and thousands of others are homeless. Does NASA which has notched up 60 years or so developing space technologies pay a carbon tax every time it fires up rocket engines as we do when we switch an electrical appliance. Let’s keep our feet firmly on earth and use the tech to help everyone not just a select few. Put your VR goggles and do your moon trip on the cheap just as Arnie did in the movie Red Planet. ANTHONY BUSUTTIL
David says: I don’t want to sound like too much of a space enthusiast… which I am… but I should point out that so far the Australian Space Agency has made no mission plans, and is in fact more of a policy body than something like NASA. As the Agency’s website says: “The Agency is responsible for whole-of-government coordination of civil space matters and is the primary source of advice to the Australian Government on civil space policy.”
And while dealing with matters here on Earth are of course very important - and there are many agencies who’s bailiwick is exactly that (though they never seem to work as well as we might hope, I do admit), space research and exploration is of vital importance to the Australian economy. Satellites can already help track extreme weather events, have boosted our communications capabilities, and help us find each other (either in the CBD or in the remote outback). Looking ahead, Australia has an important role to play in tracking space debris and other near bodies, in global communications, and in exploration of our solar system. But yes, the CSIRO does want to see the agency engage in tourism, but only in support of putting a base on the moon, which is itself a stepping stone to the great jewel of space exploration - Mars. The pizza thing? Yeah, okay, I will admit I do not want a hot ham and pineapple crashing onto my noggin from out of the blue. Fair point.
I DON’T WANT TO SOUND LIKE TOO MUCH OF A SPACE ENTHUSIAST… WHICH I AM… BUT I SHOULD POINT OUT THAT SO FAR THE AUSTRALIAN SPACE AGENCY HAS MADE NO MISSION PLANS, AND IS IN FACT MORE OF A POLICY BODY THAN SOMETHING LIKE NASA.