Well, of course; do you think that the discussion is really prepared for a hard theorem?

What I meant to offer was a general principle that a lot of things are called exponential — population and inflation being two examples — for the basic intuitive reason that they ought to be presented on a logarithmic scale. It’s not a priori a “scare word”, although, granted, population growth is sometimes described that way. It’s a valid kind of description, although of course people should understand that it is description rather than assertion.

Anyway, you said:

Since when does having ‘sub-replacement fertility rates’ mean the population is ‘stabilized’? Exponential decay is as unstable as exponential growth.

I am not completely sure how you intended your question. My answer is that empirically, most populations with sub-replacement fertility are more stable than most countries with super-replacement fertility. Italy has a more stable population than Yemen, for example. Of course neither is 100% stable, but on the other hand 100% population stability is nonsense.

There you go with trivial statements again, Greg. Any positive function can be expressed in that way!

What ‘exponential’ is primarily used for in population discussions is as a scare word.

I don’t really want to encourage this off-topic tangent, but I would like to make two mathematical points: (1) all population curves are exponential with a time-dependent exponent; (2) all population curves are approximately stable for some definition of “approximately”. Therefore whether any population curve, or an inflation curve or any other non-negative curve, is exponential is more a matter of description than assertion. Likewise whether or not any given population curve is stable.

Anyway before Jeff Foust gets too angry, I’ll get back to the main topic. I don’t agree with Griffin at all. (And I suspect that Griffin’s private views are a bit closer to me.) NASA didn’t lose its way before the VSE; NASA lost its way by hiring the bean counter who pushed for the VSE. In order to competently run a technology organization, you have to either have techies on top (as Google has, and Intel had for many years) or on tap (as Apple has, and NASA had with Webb and Dryden). With O’Keefe, NASA had neither. Running NASA with bean counters isn’t any better than running Apple with bean counters (as was tried in the 1990s).

Besides, according to Price Waterhouse Coopers, O’Keefe wasn’t even good at counting beans. He may have been cut from the same cloth as Michael Brown of FEMA.

It just proves you weren’t paying attention. It was quite well known even when O’Keefe took the NASA job that he had his sights set on returning to DoD, either as SecDef or Deputy SecDef, after the 2004 elections. When Rumsfeld announced his intention to stay, the question was not whether or when O’Keefe would jump, but to where.

Of course you did, you’re the boob who cut and pastes JSF drivel on a space politics blog.

Other more rational minds consider overpopulation to be an issue about too many humans on the planet Earth, and the associated stupidy and insanity that you so proudly exemplify.

Well, it does tend to solve earth’s human overpopulation problem and consequent ecological problems.

I thought overpopulation was a Left-ish issue …. save the whales, abort more babies, and so on.

More war, less life. What a great way to solve our population problem. Merka must be the greatest country in the whole darn galaxy.

Wrong, Greg, wrong on the facts. You are discrediting yourself.

SOURCE:Flight International
JSF special: Time for testing

By Graham Warwick in Fort Worth

Ground laboratories and flying testbeds will play a key role in ensuring the F-35 is ready for productive flight testing at sites across the USA

A pathfinder for manufacturing of the JSF, aircraft AA-1 will also pave the way for flight testing of the 14 development F-35s that follow, blazing a trail from Fort Worth in Texas to the US Air Force test centre at Edwards AFB in California and US Navy test centre at NAS Patuxent River in Maryland.

“AA-1 is the only aircraft in the original configuration, but the differences are not visible and it is very representative for the type of flight-test tasks planned,” says Tom Burbage, Lockheed Martin executive vice-president and general manager F-35 programme integration. AA-1 will evaluate aerodynamic performance, flying qualities and systems over two years of flying before handing over the test baton to the optimised-airframe F-35s that follow.

APG-81 radar
© Northrop Grumman
The APG-81 radar has already flown on Northrop’s BAC testbed

“AA-1 is an outstanding learning tool. It allows us to go fly and collect real data,” says Doug Pearson, Lockheed vice-president F-35 integrated test force. “AA-1 will do a lot of performance work, evaluate vehicle systems and basic flying qualities, validate our analytical tools, demonstrate credibility and build confidence,” he says. “We will take it to Edwards and Pax and get their infrastructure up and running.”

Although looking complete when it rolled off the assembly line in February, AA-1 was not ready to fly. After fuel system testing and structural coupling and ground vibration tests, the aircraft is in the final build – or “box swap” – phase, where flight-qualified parts not available earlier are being installed. While there are “orders of magnitude fewer such issues” than in previous programmes, final build will continue to the end of July, says Pearson.

Once completely built, the aircraft will be powered up for another system check-out, the integrated power package (IPP) will be started, then the engine, and the aircraft will be ready to begin taxi tests. “There is 40-45 manufacturing days of negative float, which we have had for a year. If we do not recover that, we will fly in late October,” says Burbage. The company had set an internal “challenge” date of 28 August for the first flight, but “it’s remarkable we’re as close as we are”, says Pearson.

“We were in and out of the fuel barn ahead of schedule,” he says. The 46 fuel probes and electrical harnesses were checked, and some replaced, but the tests were “extremely successful”, he says. “The first aircraft built usually leaks, but this did not. And manufacturing debris in the tanks is typical, but there was none. We had to flush the F-22 fuel system 70 times to get it clean, but after only 27 times the F-35 was below 200 microns.”

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http://62.189.48.33/Articles/2006/06/27/Navigation/181/207391/JSF+special+Time+for+testing.html