On Wed, 5 Feb 2003 11:54:02 -0400, you ("Stephen Bolton"
<sbolton@nbnet.nb.ca>) wrote:
>I have no doubt money must be wasted in other research areas.
>But doesn't your argument boil down to "others waste money why shouldn't
>we?"
No, actually I think it boils down to the fact that other, even much more
abstract fields are _well_ worth funding huge amounts of money, and so has
to be spaceflight, especially when considering how extremely little that is
compared to the rest of a FY budget. You can't possibly state figures
without putting them into perspective towards the rest of the household,
and certainly you can't disregard their broad short-term and long-term
value and effect. I sometimes feel it's pure magic how NASA still is
successful in doing what they're doing with that measly less-than-1% of the
US household that they're granted, and yet they're feeling the increasing
budget cuts year after year. And that is from someone who strives for
objectiveness and who is not exactly a 100% NASA fan.
CU! Markus
I don't think the basic issue is who funds what, or if research is
considered basic or "applied".
The fundamental issue is as follows:
All research costs money. Manned space research is proportionally MUCH more
expensive compared to unmanned space or ground.
Are we getting out monies worth?
When I look at what the manned LEO program has returned VS what could have
been a program with bigger space telescopes and a complete robotic
exploration of our solar system (because, face it, the manned space steals
from the unmanned space budget) I get upset. I'll take the return from the
Hubble over the return from the entire STS/ ISS program.
Steve
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