I don’t know whether this makes it a priority in your eyes, but the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter was launched in 2009, and remains an active mission.
Of course NASA’s budget — and from that, its wherewithal to do this or that — is subject to the whim of Congress. Even unmanned missions, so cheap compared to manned, are having a hard time these days getting funding.
Manned space flight and colonization of other bodies is necessary if we ever hope to explore living in places other than the Earth. Unfortunately, we evolved to live on planet Earth so living off of planet Earth requires investigation into every last aspect of human existence out in space. Everything from developing without gravity to cosmic radiation to taking a dump needs to be verified through experimentation and experience.
Why do I think it is necessary? It’s encapsulated in my mind with environmentalism. The reason why we care about disappearing species, rainforests, changing climate, ozone holes and acid rain is because these issues symbolize negatives ranging from the loss of our quality of life, to ill-health, to our deaths, to extinction of our species. We have fossil evidence that mere metabolism can completely change our environment and cause mass extinction. Although sustainability and other environmental movements are great and I support them, the Earth will eventually change to make it impossible for us to live here. We ought to have a back door. The sooner the better.
That said, it shouldn’t be done mindlessly. Unmanned missions are far exceeding expectations and it may be that all necessary information can be obtained from them. Most of everything we need to know can be accomplished through unmanned missions. Yet if colonization of all viable spots (discovered via drones) requires a lunar base, then build it. The technology is available and it gets us started on finding out what we might run into in extended human colonization of other worlds.
It’s not one or the other, but the idea here is that America has undergone a change in priorities, and space exploration, especially manned space exploration, no longer catches the imagination like it used to- not because we’ve lot our ability to dream or our will to be great, but because we’ve redefined our dreams.
Science is great. But it’s place in society has changed. There was a time, not long ago, when the world seemed like one inevitable march closer to utopia, with science leading the way. African countries were getting independence, and the mood at the time was that they were just a decade or two away to “catching up” with the west. We were curing the diseases that plagued mankind for millennia at lightening speed. There were declarations that infectious disease was essentially over. Our scientific dreams seemed right around the corner.
But that time ended. We learned the hard way that it was going to be a bumpy road. The speed and spread of drug-resistant diseases blindsided us. We never thought much about emerging diseases, and certainly never pictured anything like HIV. But in the case of medicine, what we really learned is that research is not what saves lives. We can cure more and more diseases. I will almost certainly not die of anything my ancestors died of.
But look at what people do die of.
What is tuberculosis and diarrhea doing on the worldwide list? We’ve been able to prevent and cure that stuff for ages. And the low-income country list? Low birth weight? Neonatal infections? Malaria? WTF. How can I get excited about medical research when people die in droves of things that can be cured with even the most basic health care system? All of that scientific research, and people still die from the easiest stuff in the world to cure.
Poverty is anti-science.
And yes, there is a generally recognized definition of poverty. Extreme poverty is around $1.25 a day (or rather, the amount of goods and services $1.25 a day can currently get you.) Worldwide things like staple grains, cooking oil, fuel, soap, and other basic needs cost pretty much the same wherever you go. And people need a bare minimum of these things to survive- specifically, about $1.25 a day worth of these things. 1.1 billion people do not have this. In Africa, this number is increasing. There are a few more magic numbers, but one of the big ones is around $5,000 a year. This is the point where a nation stops being vulnerable to coups, civil war, and violent upheaval. Of course, there are questions of correlation and causation. But the point remains- all evidence shows it is hard to maintain a stable and benevolent political system at less than $5,000 a year per capita.
The predicted cost of eliminating extreme poverty? Around .07% of the developed world’s GDP for around 10 years. Less than one freaking percent.
Anyway, not everyone in my generation is as worked up about global poverty as I am, but I think it represents a general trend toward being globally minded. Previous generations dreamed of America as the leader, with the highest quality of life of any country in the world. We’ve learned that a disease from remote parts of the Central Africa can kills us. We’ve seen that a political movement on the other side of the world can lead to our buildings being blown up. We recognize that the economies in China and India have a massive effect on our own. We no longer think of an America that is better than the rest of the world, because we know the world’s problems will still be at our door. We want an America that is a leader in a safe, healthy, prosperous world.
To bring up Columbus- yes, what he did was pretty cool (well, if you discount that it bankrupted Spain, destroyed civilizations, and killed millions.)
But Columbus had a nice big boat. He had navigation instruments. He had food technology to sustain his crew for the voyage.
Imagine if this all happened 10,000 years earlier, when Oog the caveman decided that mankind would perish if it did not conquer the seas and discover what lays beyond. He probably got on his raft, pushed off, and died without having learned a thing. And if his daughters Urk and Ing did the same thing, they would meet the same fate. Indeed, even if his entire village dedicated themselves to that one goal, the end result would still be generations and generations of needless effort. Meanwhile the tribe next door that focused on stuff like “agriculture” would quickly destroy the tribe that launches itself pointlessly into the sea.
Although they probably were not cavemen, that is exactly what happened. They explored and conquered the Americas. Later on, different humans explored and conquered the Americas. Before that different human subspecies explored and conquered all the other continents except Antartica and they were subsequently conquered by other exploring human subspecies, and so on…
In all cases, they probably did not just push off and hope for the best either. They gathered data on what was on the next horizon and continued to push on. Much like spending time and money on exploring our solar system and extrasolar planets with unmanned optical and robotic devices followed by human colonization.
The only substantial difference between us 10K years ago and us now is technology, the terrain and scientific methodology. The drive and benefits of heeding that drive are still the same.
But they went in small steps, when there were obvious benefits to moving on, without radical leaps in technology. The world was settled by people moving their villages ten feet over to the right to put some distance between themselves and the garbage pit. That, and shipwrecked fishermen.
There will be a time when space exploration makes sense. We are nowhere near that time.
You’d think so, but Spain actually went flat broke because it was bringing back so much silver and gold from America. The more gold they brought in, the less it was worth, and the more they spent to get what they needed to keep their gig going (wood for boats, cloth for sail, metal for cannon, grain to feed their armies etc…).
Spanish exploitation of the New World made much of Europe rich. Except Spain.
Well, that and the gap between technology and physical distance. “Advanced sailing vessel that can cross a globe of estimated circumference X to reach presumed land mass Y” is quite different from “Spaceship that can travel X light years to the nearest undiscovered inhabitable planet Y before everyone on board dies”.
The Apollo program was once described by Prof. Noam Chomsky as a modern “roman circus”-and he was right.
Robotic probes make much more sense-until we develop nuclear pulse-jet rockets, manned space travel is too slow and too expensive. And no, the analogy with the voyages of Columbus is incorrect-Castlian Spain reaped hge returns from their New World colonies-a Moon or Mars colony will absorb billions and not return a dime.:smack:
What I hear you saying is:
My response: How about we try to do both? The reason why tuberculosis and cholera are preventable is directly due to scientific innovations from yesteryear. The reason why HIV drugs are cheap enough for poor governments to buy in bulk and distribute for free or low cost is because wealthier governments invested heavily in research years ago. So diverting funding for medical R&D to eradicate poverty just means that not only will richer people suffer from “1st world diseases”, but poor countries will not be able to treat their own populations for those same diseases, when they become more problematic than famines.
Also, to be all selfishy, why should my tax dollars not help me and mine first? I’d like some of my government’s resources to go towards fixing the problems in my backyard before going to a backyard halfway across the world. Like the crime in my neighborhood. It’s not “third world” crime, but does make the bullets less dangerous? Or protecting our drinking water. Cholera kills now, yes. But is it better to die tomorrow, from PCBs and mercury? Or watch children suffer from neurological conditions because their parents supplemented their diet with contaminated rockfish they got out of the local creek? Dying is dying, whether it’s a starving pot-bellied kid in Africa or a cancer-stricken kid in the US. If resources are limited, I don’t know why I shouldn’t want my money to go to the dying kid down the street versus the dying kid on another continent.
My response: This is crazy. Science is probably the best way to get people out of poverty. Everything from agriculture to child-rearing are improved by scientific enlightenment. Jobs are created with scientific innovation. See India. Compare and contrast Japan and China. See which countries in Africa are booming and why. I love reading about creative technologies that are helping poor people in inexpensive yet meaningful ways. Like solar-powered LED lanterns. Or silver-coated ceramic filters that provide safe drinking water.
Science allows activists like yourself to locate problems, through advances in satellite technology, communications, and geographic information systems. You can eradicate poverty without these things, but they sure make doing so a lot easier and efficient. But you can’t pick and choose which scientific endeavors you want and not fund the ones that don’t seem useful to you. A single person is not prescient enough to know all the applications of a given discovery.
My response: I don’t know why you keeping saying this. “We” don’t have any collective dream. At least not one that’s any different than what past people had. I’m sure if you quizzed most Americans about what they want most, they wouldn’t have either manned explorations or global poverty eradication on their list. Most people would probably say they’d like prolonged longevity or better cancer-fighting drugs. Or, as Boomers age, a cure for Alzheimer’s.
But just because that’s what people want, that doesn’t mean that’s what we should work for. Maybe living longer isn’t in our best interest, and people are simply being selfish when they wish for this crazy thing. Maybe eradicating poverty is a noble idea, but it’s impractical and overly idealistic. My point is just because a dream is widespread or common, that alone doesn’t make it better than any other objective.
My response: The only reason we can say this is because we are the result of what they did. We don’t know about all the failed attempts and the foolhardy mistakes. How could we?
Just for the record, I’m not saying we should go to Mars or Venus or any other planet. I’m all for a moratorium on NASA spending until we can get the country’s finances in order. But I don’t think that should extend to all scientific funding. I do think there’s value in studying subjects that have no discernable applications to the present moment.
I agree with everything you posted but I have to wonder at this part. A moratorium on NASA spending until the country’s finances are in order is basically saying end NASA.
Then in the next sentences you basically say you support the types of things NASA does.
Leading me to the question: Which of these programs featured as current missions at NASA do not deserve your last sentence?
What I think is that no sooner we find that China or other country is finally seriously making moves to land on the Moon or other planets with more than just probes, that then we will see a big move from the part of the USA.
Is it wrong for me to say I don’t mind if NASA has to close shop for a couple of years, but NIH and NSF can stay? I mean, I’d rather NASA not close at all (I didn’t mean to write “I’m all for…”) But if that’s what “the people” want, I’m not against it. Just as long as “pure” science continues to get funded somehow. I would hate for us to become “anti-science” in an effort to fix poverty, which would be counter-productive IMHO.
You are arguing in hindsight and don’t seem to realize that early Americans and Columbus and all the other humans that have explored new environments never knew what the benefits would be either. That fact should be obvious to you.
As for the last sentence quoted, please provide a list of reasonable conditions for when we can start shooting cheap probes into our solar system like we are now.
I quoted both of you not only because you replied to me but also because your statements fit together. Space exploration is a massive undertaking. Massive undertakings take a hell of a long time to develop. The time to get started is now. The technology and knowledge cannot be developed overnight. Also, there are probably plenty of places that can be reasonably colonized in our solar system.
Thanks for the clarification. I did not entirely understand what you meant.
I think the premise that “the people” are against NASA is baseless and even if it were the case, a responsible leader wouldn’t listen. I think it is every bit as valid as NSF and NIH. I sincerely believe that of any of these departments NASA or NSF must be the most efficient in preventing our tax dollars going to bullshit science. NIH has to have a higher percentage of wasted dollars due to its mission.
I have no idea where even sven is getting this from. It is such a bizarre notion that its probably what made me post to the thread. I want to know where it came from. Maybe in certain circles its all the rage to speak of space exploration as childish while calling it last generation, and lament how it apparently prevents us from saving every human from malaria or something.
It’s not that we need to put our energy towards making a better life here on Earth. It’s that we already have. This is not a policy piece about how I think things should be. It’s more of an explanation to the bewildered folks who see the moratorium on manned space travel as the abandoning of a dream. It’s not the abandoning of a dream, it’s the evolution of one. Other things have captured our imagination.
How do I know this? See Exhibit A: The decline of the manned space program in America. It’s what got us in this conversation in the first place.
Science hasn’t reached a plateau, but we’ve learned that science without application is nearly worthless. Fifty years ago, we had a long list of diseases that were ripe for eradication. We managed to get…one. We know exactly how to eradicate these diseases. We have everything we need to do it. The problem is not the technology. The problem is a lack of political will. Where is the “awe” factor of science when we can’t use it to solve really incredibly basic human problems? This isn’t to say that science isn’t an awesome human undertaking- it is. But churning out engineers doesn’t make a country great. Having great vision makes a country great.
You often hear the musing “what would the government be like if it were all scientists.” Well, China’s government is mostly engineers. It’s not the worst government in the world, but it’s not an exceptionally awesome one, either. While China has made some incredible leaps, that’s not really because of science. China boomed because the government finally allowed people to run businesses. A ditch digger could have figured that one out.
Of course you hope that scares resources benefit you and yours, first. But to envision the brightest future of the world as a handful of wealthy countries surrounded by a sea of impoverishment? That a piss-poor dreaming. If you can dream about conquering the heavens, surely you can dream about diarrhea not being on the top 10 disease list.
The pieces about “amazing simple technology is going to save Africa” are compelling, but I’d argue that they appeal to exactly the worldview that I say is on the decline. We’ve been trying to force solar cookers on people for decades, and it’s never taken off, but we just keep trying. We’ve been inventing all kinds of filters, but really bleach is readily available and cheap pretty much everywhere and works just as well.
We are not going to find the magic piece of technology that saves everyone. Again, we can’t even implement the ones that we have. Mosquito nets, antibiotics, VIP toilets and bleach are all it’d take to save millions of lives. If we can’t get those to people, how are we going to reach them with the magic water filter? And in reality, the solutions to these problems are not with new technology, but with the same technology that keeps us from losing kids to the runs or expiring from malaria. If I moved to Africa, I’d build a house with window screens, a borehole well, and a septic system. I’d visit a Western-standard hospital when I got sick or gave birth. And I wouldn’t stand a large chance of dying from local diseases, even if I was in the sickest most disease ridden part of Africa. The problem is not biological. It’s structural. I’m not biologically less susceptible to disease, I’m structurally less susceptible. And technology can’t fix that.
There is a generational zeitgeist. Obviously no generation is the borg. But there are broad trends. Millennials are less supportive of an assertive approach to national security than their predecessors. They are less likely to see military might as the path to peace- and a lot of space rhetoric was ultimately about military might. Younger people are more likely to report having participated in volunteer work than Baby Boomers. They are more open to immigration, a sign of their global outlook. They are hugely more likely to buy products that represent their values- such as Toms shoes or environmentally friendly products. There is a documented trend towards values-based civic engagement and a global outlook, and a trend away from nationalism.
I think we should just move the space program to Africa. It’s a win-win.
Sure, you’ve got a few hundred more years under your belt. Easy bet to make in hindsight. But then, they usually are.
Space is not a fad. Space is where we exist.
I think the Dogon people of Mali should head it up. They seem to know some things.