Keith Curtis writes "I recently discovered that Dr. Bradley C. Edwards, noted expert on the Space Elevator pays $4 for coffee at the same Starbucks that I do. I asked him if he would meet up with me and chat and he graciously agreed. I recorded the interview for posterity. In our wide-ranging conversation we talked about NASA politics, getting energy from space, location, space tourism, software, nanotech, and several other topics."Ads_xl=0;Ads_yl=0;Ads_xp='';Ads_yp='';Ads_xp1='';Ads_yp1='';Ads_par='';Ads_cnturl='';Ads_prf='page=article';Ads_channels='RON_P6_IMU';Ads_wrd='space,interviews';Ads_kid=0;Ads_bid=0;Ads_sec=0; Interview with Dr. Bradley C. Edwards Log in/Create an Account | Top | 104 comments | Search Discussion Display Options Threshold: -1: 104 comments 0: 96 comments 1: 76 comments 2: 54 comments 3: 11 comments 4: 7 comments 5: 4 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. Edited off the start of the interview (Score:5, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 15, @01:39PM (#13797967) Keith Curtis: Excuse me, aren't you Dr. Bradley C. Edwards... THE Dr. Bradley C. Edwards, noted expert on the Space Elevator?Dr. Bradley C. Edwards: Yes. Aren't you the guy that that's been stalking me for the past year? THE guy I have a restraining order against?Keith Curtis: Guilty as charged! Now that we have introductions out of the way, can I have an interview for my blog?! I'll pay for your Venti Iced Caramel Macchiato.Dr. Bradley C. Edwards: Alright, since you already know what I order on Wednesdays, I might as well.Keith Curtis: AWESOME! I'm gonna be famous on /.!!!! [ Reply to ThisMOD PARENT UP by WilliamSChips (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @01:44PMRe:MOD PARENT UP! by justins (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @10:04PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. The Space Elevator is a great idea, (Score:2, Funny) by mtec (572168) on Saturday October 15, @01:44PM (#13797995) with no place to go but up! [ Reply to This Re:The Space Elevator is a great idea, (Score:4, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 15, @01:54PM (#13798045) As far as i know, the only problem is that it will take you more than 2 days to go up.Might be a good idea to get that 60gb ipod if you didn't already. I'dd hate to listen to elevator music for two days straight. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:The Space Elevator is a great idea, by SteveAyre (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @04:53PM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Site slashdotted, article text here (Score:5, Informative) by rastakid (648791) on Saturday October 15, @01:45PM (#13798002) (http://vincent.vanscherpenseel.nl/ | Last Journal: Sunday March 13, @06:13AM) Interview with Dr. Bradley EdwardsOctober 14, 2005 on 1:28 pm | In Uncategorized |Seattle, A Hotbed For Space Elevator Development? KC: My jaw dropped when I went to my nearest Starbucks, saw your artwork on the wall, and realized that you lived in Seattle. How long have you been here? It doesn't exactly seem to be a hotbed for space elevator work... BE: I did my work for NIAC (NASA Institute For Advanced Concepts) here in 2000, and then moved back in June. I was working with people everywhere; most of the collaboration was virtual, and many folks I didn't meet until the end. I don't think I met Eric Westling until after we published our book (The Space Elevator: A Revolutionary Earth-to-Space Transportation System). A few people I'm currently working with I still haven't met. I don't work with people just because they're local, I have to find people I think are the best. It depends on what I'm working on. It's an effort that can be largely broken up into sections. "Here is the anchor station, go do it." Actually, it's great that I don't have to have everyone in the same room because it's just not possible. I tried to look up your biography on the Internet, and couldn't track down some of the organizations you've worked in. Some of them are probably from the early Internet days... We've been trying to get various projects started. A few were a few false starts, or in some cases just testing the waters. HighLift Systems was a Seattle-based company, and was one of those false starts. I closed it down. I'm not affiliated with LiftPort. I have worked with LiftPort's founder Michael Laine a bit at HighLift in Seattle before we parted ways. [Not on the best of terms; juicy but unsubstantiated gossip about LiftPort removed, Meow!! -ed]NASA Versus Private Industry Did you see Michael Griffin's interview in USA Today last week? No, but I know the general gist. It's not a surprise. In my mind the Space Shuttle and Space Station are not valuable efforts. It's not what NASA should be doing. NASA is using technology from commercial enterprises, or very old technology from the 70's to try and do space exploration. If they are going to be a real premier space agency, they need to be pushing it. They should be doing stuff which looks to us like science fiction... It shouldn't be science fiction, but they should be pushing the boundaries and doing work that inspires. That's what Apollo was. The technology for Apollo existed before the program started; they took that knowledge and pushed it to its limits, and it literally inspired the world. I wasn't around then, but it seems like peoplecared what NASA did back then. NASA has their Moon and Mars pictures up on their website, but I don't know if anyone cares. If you squint as you look, you'd think it was 1930. It is history; it's old news. And since then, they've done very little. It seems like there was a long-standing debate between rockets and the Space Shuttle. From where you sit, that's like choosing between Nicki and Paris Hilton. Even high up in NASA management, they won't officially say it - but they have said it directly to me - that nothing substantial in space can be done with rockets. A federal program with lots of money can take some people up there, but it won't be able to commercialize space. We've been going at it for thirty-five years now, and we've put up telecommunications systems and GPS. If there's a buck to be made and a product to be built, it'll get done. With current technology, I think we've developed space commercially as far as we can. We need something dramatically different--a brand new market, a brand new technology. Economists should get that. How did trains and highways change America? Private enterprise is starting to get it. NASA hasn't shown much interest on the space elevator, but there are a number of private entities that have. But we just laughed at a bunch of them: HighLift, LiftPort. Do any of them have billions of dollars? ThRead the rest of this comment... [ Reply to ThisRe:Site slashdotted, article text here by Thing 1 (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @06:40PM quick! (Score:2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 15, @01:52PM (#13798037) dude, you put in your actual email address mailto:keithcu@gmail.com [mailto]!! teh spambots are coming! [ Reply to This Wow... (Score:2, Funny) by jettoki (894493) on Saturday October 15, @01:52PM (#13798038) That is probably the most informed discussion about the current state of advanced energy/space technologies that I have ever read. Dr. Edwards seems like a very even-handed, practical, and worldly individual, with the kind of vision we need to truly make progress in coming decades.Too bad he's is a space elevator wacko. Narf!@#!!Space shuttle 4-eva! [ Reply to ThisRe:Wow... by Wyatt Earp (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @02:00PMRe:Wow... by jettoki (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @02:06PMRe:Wow... by Wyatt Earp (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @03:21PMRe:Wow... by Thing 1 (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @07:01PMRe:Wow... by Rei (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @09:15PMRe:Wow... by thrillseeker (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:18PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:Wow... by MidnightBrewer (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @07:37PMRe:Wow... by Seumas (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @02:29PM How about doing a question and answer session ..? (Score:1, Interesting) by pickyouupatnine (901260) on Saturday October 15, @02:08PM (#13798102) (http://www.ratemyparty.com/) Sometime ago I heard that to pull off the space elevator .. the material cost would be massive that we didnt have enough steel cable to do such a thing and only experimental substances (like spiderweb yarn) would meet the challenge of providing that much material.Is this true? What sort of materials will the Space Elevator make use of?How about doing a QandA with Slashdot user questions? :DCheers! [ Reply to This Re:How about doing a question and answer session . (Score:5, Informative) by The Snowman (116231) * <john@johngaughan.net> on Saturday October 15, @02:29PM (#13798196) (http://www.johngaughan.net/) Sometime ago I heard that to pull off the space elevator .. the material cost would be massive that we didnt have enough steel cable to do such a thing and only experimental substances (like spiderweb yarn) would meet the challenge of providing that much material. Steel is extremely dense. The sheer quantity of steel needed would mean the elevator would collapse under its own weight. That is why nobody plans on using steel cables. Instead, carbon nanotubes are the way to go. Essentially, these are thin strands of carbon engineered in such a way that they are light and strong. A strand the thickness of a human hair has the strength of a steel girder, but weighs around 0.00001% as much. Nanotechnology means more than just making things small, it also means building life-size objects but engineering them at the molecular level to have special properties, such as high strength or low density. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by planetoid (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @02:34PMRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by bleak sky (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @02:58PMRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by wfberg (Score:3) Saturday October 15, @03:01PM Re:How about doing a question and answer session . (Score:5, Interesting) by Winkhorst (743546) on Saturday October 15, @03:27PM (#13798450) Because they are just now building the first plant to manufacture carbon nanotubes in Milville, New Jersey, you dolt.I read this website and I realise that beyond the limited realm of computers the folk who hang out here are, with a few exceptions, generally as ignorant as the average man in the street. The idea that someone with a computer and access to the internet would not understand that carbon nanotubes are cutting edge technology and not something available off the shelf at your local Ace Hardware is mind boggling. This cuts to the very heart of the question of worldview. I have to wonder what the worldview is of someone who doesn't understand where his civilization stands technologically--what is possible and what is not yet possible. [ Reply to This | ParentRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by mtec (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:44PMRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by smallpaul (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @09:08PMRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by justins (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @10:06PMRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by jspoon (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @10:25PMTypes of "strength" by Kadin2048 (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @05:36PM1 reply beneath your current threshold.Re:How about doing a question and answer session . by ace1317 (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @04:23PMRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by The Snowman (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @06:41PMRe:How about doing a question and answer session . by ace1317 (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @06:56PMToo bad there is no bulk material with those props by Doug Coulter (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @07:49PM2 replies beneath your current threshold. Didja get around to the subject (Score:3, Insightful) by lheal (86013) <lheal1999 AT yahoo DOT com> on Saturday October 15, @02:09PM (#13798105) (http://healconsulting.com/ | Last Journal: Friday June 17, @09:17PM) ... of harmonics? That is, how on earth (or wherever) are they going to keep a giant 20,000-mile long (minimum) string from vibrating, tearing itself away from its moorings and giving passengers a severe case of lawnmower shakes? Awful hard to do the random weighting thing they do with high-tension power lines when you want a robot to climb it (fast). ... or terrorist attacks? Yah, I know that's passe and overrated as a topic, and that it applies to any transport medium. But it still ought to be dealt with at the design stage rather than afterwards, I think. ... or birds? Doesn't anyone care about birds? :-). [ Reply to ThisRe:Didja get around to the subject by Macka (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @02:43PMRe:Didja get around to the subject by rbarreira (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:25PMRe:Didja get around to the subject by Mac Degger (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:50PMRe:Didja get around to the subject by HawkingMattress (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @02:51PMRe:Didja get around to the subject by ZachPruckowski (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:35PMRe:Didja get around to the subject by frakir (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @04:03PM One missing question (Score:4, Insightful) by Libor Vanek (248963) <libor,vanek&gmail,com> on Saturday October 15, @02:21PM (#13798153) (http://slashdot.org/) I just don't see one, the most fundamental, question in all interview. I don't worry about climber construction or powering them (it's after all "just" engineering - even if powering means, that you'll put very very small reactor on the climber and restrict it going only from 1000 Km and higher and for 0-1000 you'll use chemical rockets) - BUT (!) AFAIK the material is problem! I've read somewhere, that the strongest nanotube ever produced is still only 50% of necessary strength - and THAT'S a LONG way to go! (you can't use just 100% necessary strength - you need more for safety - something like 130-150%!) [ Reply to ThisRe:One missing question by jeremymiles (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @03:19PMRe:One missing question by Mac Degger (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:54PM Recorded? (Score:2) by FlynnMP3 (33498) on Saturday October 15, @02:42PM (#13798240) Guess my head is the wrong place again. I just finished up some DVD authoring. I was kind of looking forward to an audio recording. Interesting interview regardless. :) [ Reply to This I never understood... (Score:2, Insightful) by Bulmakau (918237) on Saturday October 15, @02:47PM (#13798265) I never understood why man is obsessed with going to space... I bet it has nice view of our globe ;) but I understand its the most dangerous place on earth (hmm... actually off earth), right after port morsbey ;)The concept of having a big "rope" in the middle of the sea, reaching out to space, with elavator/s connected to it, exposed to attacks from Al Quaida, Bush (if Al Quaida ever uses it), The sea, the wind, commets, space debree, mir stations, dumb people pressing the wrong buttons, harrasing the elavator or crowding it (especially with the overweight problem in the world) and whatnot.. it will NEVER work (Just like trying to make medicine of germs). Mark my words ;) [ Reply to ThisRe:I never understood... by D3m3rz3l (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @03:41PMRe:I never understood... by RicktheBrick (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @04:13PMWhat use are controls? by mangu (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @04:44PMRe:What use are controls? by Kadin2048 (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @05:29PMRe:What use are controls? by Leghkster (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @09:19PMRe:I never understood... by QuantumG (Score:2) Sunday October 16, @12:04AM1 reply beneath your current threshold. Was this a serious interview? (Score:1) by darthium (834988) on Saturday October 15, @02:59PM (#13798331) I wonder if it's just a parody...or if it's been taken seriously in Slashdot...I rarely come over here, but, AFAIK, there are very interesting discussions here, and very bright people...that's why it surprised me to see this interview treated as it it was a serious proposition (even in the responses exposing concerns)...The most basic common sense says that such 'Space Elevator' can't be a serious project, is there something I'm missing? [ Reply to ThisRe:Was this a serious interview? by thrillseeker (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:14PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by darthium (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @03:22PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by thrillseeker (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:39PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by chaidawg (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:42PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by Mac Degger (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @03:57PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by fader (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @04:15PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by rebelcool (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @10:15PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by Blakey Rat (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @11:54PM Re:Was this a serious interview? (Score:4, Informative) by chaidawg (170956) on Saturday October 15, @03:19PM (#13798408) (http://www.porkisnotaverb.com/) Yes, it was a serious interview. The idea of a space elevator has been bandied around in scientific and science fields for a number of years, but the strength of the cable needed to hold it up was always a sticking factor. With the discovery of Carbon-60 (Buckyballs and Buckytubes) the strength factor is theoretically within reach.The basic idea is an elevator with its center of gravity at geosyncronous orbit, making the elevator stay in one spot over the earth. It would allow for much larger space lift capacities and much lower costs per pound.Read more at:Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]The Space Elevator Reference [spaceelevator.com]Liftport Group, a consortium of companies working on space elevator tech [liftport.com]Also, for a good sci-fi treatment of space elevators, read Kim Stanley-Robinson's Red-Gree-Blue Mars Trilogy [ Reply to This | ParentRe:Was this a serious interview? by forkazoo (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @05:09PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by Mr. Foogle (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @05:53PMRe:Was this a serious interview? by Wolfbone (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @06:16PMGravity, light speed no barriers to patent madness by D4C5CE (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @07:44PMRe:Gravity, light speed no barriers to patent madn by Wolfbone (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @09:32PM Rocket... er, Elevator Scientist, Huh? (Score:2) by dwm (151474) on Saturday October 15, @04:28PM (#13798806) He can't be all that smart if he pays $4 for a cup of coffee... [ Reply to ThisRe:Rocket... er, Elevator Scientist, Huh? by sgt_doom (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @05:07PM props on one thing (Score:1, Troll) by justins (80659) on Saturday October 15, @06:55PM (#13799385) (http://www.yahoo.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday May 22, @11:57AM) Congrats on finding and interviewing the only science PhD in the country who doesn't think Bush is a fucking idiot. [ Reply to This Build a frickin' bridge... (Score:3, Insightful) by Goonie (8651) * <robert.merkel@b e n a m bra.org> on Saturday October 15, @06:55PM (#13799386) (http://benambra.org/) As innumerable slashdotters have said before, when Bradley Edwards can build a bridge as long as this one [benambra.org] out of nanotubes of the requisite tensile strength, then I'll take the space elevator seriously. Until then, it's science fiction and NASA's quite correct to plan its Moon-Mars program out of technology that actually exists. [ Reply to ThisRe:Build a frickin' bridge... by Fmuctohekerr (Score:1) Saturday October 15, @07:37PMRe:Build a frickin' bridge... by Goonie (Score:2) Saturday October 15, @10:04PM Arthur C. Clarke on **AA versus Future of Mankind (Score:2) by D4C5CE (578304) on Saturday October 15, @06:56PM (#13799390) From Arthur C. Clarke's recent contribution on Space Elevators to the The Times [timesonline.co.uk]:If this ever happens, the most expensive component of travel around the solar system would be for life support -- and inflight movies. A true visionary, he seems to have realised that the greatest threat to the survival of the human race here on earth and in space could be DRM under the DMCA&friends...While we're at it, back in Forbidden Planet (1956) [imdb.com], didn't they already talk about civilisations wiped out by "the monster from the id"? Also 50 years ahead of their time, truly +5 Foresightful, was that id [reference.com] as in RF-ID, by any chance? [ Reply to This Will you ask him to take followup questions? (Score:3, Insightful) by ankhank (756164) * on Saturday October 15, @08:29PM (#13799818) (Last Journal: Monday January 24, @12:06AM) 1) What does he know that he can tell usabout electrical potential differences along the cable, both crossing Earth's magnetic field lines and between upper atmosphere and ground? I think yet another short tether test is anticipated soon by satellite, I recall the first one failed. I know quite a few methods are used to trigger lightning now, from rocket-carried wires to lasers ionizing a column of air.2) Where can we invest?3) Wouldn't a branching structure like a suspension bridge -- several orbital counterweights somewhat separated, crosslinked, and several sea level contact points -- be safer than a single cable, spread out to protect against the random meteor or space debris impact, lightning strike, aircraft strike, or structural flaw?4) When I lived in Seattle in the early '70s, before Starbucks, there were good coffee houses all over the place. Does anyone besides Starbucks sell coffee in his neighborhood now? [ Reply to This 4$ for what? (Score:1) by MarcoPon (689115) on Saturday October 15, @08:44PM (#13799907) (http://mark0.net/onlinetrid.aspx) 4$, and I probably won't even be able to call that "coffe"; warm, black water may be more appropriate. Crazy stuff...Bye! [ Reply to This Shorting out the ionisphere? (Score:2) by DigiShaman (671371) on Saturday October 15, @11:51PM (#13800705) (http://www.contoso.com/) With a space elevator, is it possible the carbon cables could cause a short between the ground and ionisphere? How would this effect weather? Could this problem be turned around and used as a meathod of powering the elevator and then some? [ Reply to This11 replies beneath your current threshold.