thoughts on NASA?

[huggytree]

NASA is no longer going to send men into space.....i see it as a further decline of the United States....we will no longer a leader in space.

anyone see anything on the up tick in our country?

[Spider]

I thought I heard President Obama talking about the US having men orbiting Mars by 2030. Doesn't sound like a decline in American leadership to me.

Or am I mistaken?

[vangogh]

huggy where are you seeing there will be no more people in space? That might be in the short term, but I've never seen any suggestions that it would a permanent thing.

I'm not seeing the connection between the current state of NASA and the possible decline of the U.S.

[KristineS]

All I heard was that we were moving focus away from the moon, and the Shuttles, which are getting old are going to be retired. I know there were some people complaining about the fact that trying to get back to the moon was perhaps to be scrapped, but I didn't take that to mean that the entire program was being shelved.

I see lots of things on the upswing in our country. It's just that the people who are doing those things are putting their heads down and actually doing rather than complaining about politics and how rotten things are. That comment, by the way, applies equally to both parties.

[Harold Mansfield]

NASA is no longer going to send men into space.....i see it as a further decline of the United States....we will no longer a leader in space.

anyone see anything on the up tick in our country?

I think it was more directed at we are going to stop repeating the same things over and over again. We haven't made many advances in space travel since the 60's...we are still bound to our immediate area, orbiting the Earth...and there's really no reason to keep going to the moon if we aren't going to do anything up there but walk around.

As long as there are 1000's of critical satellites orbiting the earth, men will always have to go up there and fix them.

The Shuttle program is pretty old and did wonders for deploying the communications systems that we rely on heavily today, GPS immediately comes to mind, not to mention a lot of knowledge was gained that will enable us to take things to the next level...actual space travel.

Nothing is in decline, things are just moving on. We can't stay in the 80's forever.

[billbenson]

And you think there isn't covert stuff going on, possibly manned by our Govt?

[huggytree]

we are going to be paying 10's of millions to the Russians to get our guys into space.

why?

name somethings which are improving or on the up swing for the country?

no one into space short term....short term can also mean never....from what ive heard all the ground crew guys will be gone and it can take 10 years to get back all that lost knowledge when we decide to go back into space....i dont hear anything positive.....glad you all think you do....

nothings in decline eh?....are we in the same country?

i think both political parties are to blame for the decline...im not happy with either

[Harold Mansfield]

name somethings which are improving or on the up swing for the country?


"I don't mean to go off on a rant here" (©Dennis Miller), but...I can sit here all day long in front of my 50' T.V., with 250 channels of 24 hr programming piped into it, with the A.C. blowing, working from home via my high speed Internet, with a designer bottled water on my desk, next to my herbal tea (because I have a hangover from partying at a $10 mil nightclub,that was inside of a $900 million dollar CASINO the night before), which is next to 2 smart phones ( that have more computing power than the moon landing..all of it), talking to a paying client that found me via the web without me having to spend one dime for advertising, that will send me instant money electronically, while looking out of my office window at the waterfall cascading into the pool...Remington Shotgun in the closet, Desert Eagle 9mm in the nightstand...a closet full of clothes, car in the drive, living in a condo by myself that is 3 times the living space size of the average Japanese FAMILY, and complain about America all I want....and I would sound like an idiot to just about everyone else in the World.



This is the reason so many other people in the world call us selfish and arrogant.

We complain about NASA (whom we don't work for and has nothing to do with my paycheck), when there are people not eating. Actually eating. They have no food. and there's a lot of them

I went over a buddy's house for his birthday the other day. His wife brought him a new smoker. There was more meat on the grill for a few people, than a few million families will see in the course of a year, maybe 2. As Americans, this is not out of the ordinary. we have whole Networks on TV dedicated to food 24 hrs a day, 7 days a week.


We really do take what we have, and where we live for granted and feel that we are personally entitled.to what ever our minds can dream up.

If you have noticed..all of the countries and people that hate us? They all have one thing in common. It's not religion. It's Economics. They are all poor.
They aren't protesting America in Gucci shoes, they are protesting America in sandals on a dirt road.

We are only limited in this country by our imagination, education and willingness to take a chance and believe in ourselves.
We can do anything we want, whenever we want to do it. People hate that about us.
How many of the other 7 billion people in this world, can say the same thing?

I hear people all the time complain about the economy and "How am I supposed to do this...?" and "How am I supposed to do that..?", but the great thing about this country is...there is an answer. It's just a matter of if you are willing to put forth the effort to find it, learn it, and execute it.

No one in this country has to just sit there and take it in the chops.

[Patrysha]

Where oh where is a clapping smiley when you need it?

Nice Rant!

And I am very jealous of your lifestyle...ahhh but for a few crazy choices along the way...

[Spider]

Super post, Harold.

Unfortunately, the complainers of this world fail to understand that the only way their complaints will help their situation is when they get off their buts and make the changes they want to see happen.

First, they have to change their mind. But when their minds are seeing nothing but decline, it's near impossible to make them see progress. It's something each individual must do for themselves. One must first decide that things are good, then start looking for things that are good, and soon, things will be good.

Actually it's very simple - it's just hard to do, that's all. But simple, once you realize it.

[Harold Mansfield]

And I am very jealous of your lifestyle...ahhh but for a few crazy choices along the way...

Ha ha, don't be. I buy herbal tea on sale in bulk, the nightclub passes are always freebies, the cable bill is kicking my butt, I never buy clothes at full price, and I'm making payments on the TV.
But at least I'm able to do that in our society.

I also don't have kids, and am not married so it's easier to waste money on things.

[Blessed]

I must clap for you too Harold - what an elegant rant.

And Frederick - that's the rub isn't it? - in order to see change we have to get off our butts and work to make it happen. Whether it's politics, or economics, or social status - we live in America, we can see change happen if we'll motivate ourselves to work for it.

Ah Patrysha - the choices we've made that have led to the lifestyles we lead... there are things here I wish were different, but overall - I'm happy, I wouldn't trade my kids for all the wholesale herbal tea in the world :D or anything else for that matter! Fortunately we waited a few years before having kids and were able to "waste" some money on "things" we're glad we have now!

[Steve B]

Wow - nothing more to add - nice rant Harold!

[Harold Mansfield]

I think I overheard this from a comedian a while back about the Food Channel, the joke was something like:

"People are starving all over the world and we have so much food in this country that we actually pay to watch people cooking it and eating it on T.V.

We have so much food that we have food allergies. They don't have food allergies in Africa.

What's next, The Money Channel? Where we just sit back and watch people counting money all day long ? It's no wonder so many people in the world hate us."

And then he went on to talk about how Americans complain about fuel prices, but pay money to sit in big stadiums, that are only used once a year or twice a year, to watch people driving in circles burning it up. And actually cheer the person that burns it up the fastest.

I think it may have been Chris Rock a few years back.

But I was a big Dennis Miller fan and one of his quotes was: "A bad day in America is a hell of a lot better than a good day almost everywhere else in the world."

[Dan Furman]

Ha ha, don't be. I buy herbal tea on sale in bulk, the nightclub passes are always freebies, the cable bill is kicking my butt, I never buy clothes at full price, and I'm making payments on the TV.
But at least I'm able to do that in our society.

I also don't have kids, and am not married so it's easier to waste money on things.

That's the game-changer. Getting married, not so much (in fact, it makes life even easier, really. Two working can live pretty darn good.)

[billbenson]

I'll take huggys side a little bit here. A lot of innovation came out of space travel. Also, probably a lot of military benefits as well. I believe fiber optics came out of space travel.

My question is, is this still the best way to spend our money for research and development? I suspect that most of this can now be done in an automated fashion. Yet another example of machines taking jobs away from people :)

[Spider]

On that score, Bill, I remember seeing a report on space travel way back - possibly in the 70s, 80s - that said categorically that man did not need to go into space, that it was much more efficient to man space vehicles with robots that were controlled from earth. Live human beings were only being used for the public interest, to garner excitement and interest, and stir the oimagination, of the population at large.

It was argued that without the public's excitement, nothing would get approved. In effect, the manned space flights were nothing more than promotional junkets and that the real work was being done by robotic spacecraft controlled from earth.

Even in the 70s, medical doctors were performing surgical procedures by doctor controlled robots - it was as practical for a doctor to perform a very intricate operation from across the country as it was from the next room.

If there are to be no more manned space flights until needed, it tells me we are about to embark on far more useful and adventurous journeys into space with robots than we could ever accomplish with manned flights.

[Harold Mansfield]

Any manned space flight that leaves our orbit is just impossible. I mean who wants to go on a 10 year mission just to leave the solar system that has already been mapped and observed to death...and then turn around and take 10 years to get back?

We will never be able to have any kind of manned space travel until we can safely go faster than the speed of light.

[billbenson]

Frederick, that wouldn't surprise me at all. I know a lot of heads were looking at the TV for the first Lunar landing.

Harold, there are people out there that would be willing to sign up. I tend to agree with Spider though. It's just not necessary and dramatically increases the cost of space missions.

[Harold Mansfield]

Harold, there are people out there that would be willing to sign up.

I guess there probably are, but even Star Trek was a 5 year mission. It's almost ( not a definite) that there is no intelligent life within our Solar System.

I would gather the reason to travel outside of the Solar System would be to make contact with anything that may be out there.

[billbenson]

I guess there probably are, but even Star Trek was a 5 year mission. It's almost ( not a definite) that there is no intelligent life within our Solar System.

I would gather the reason to travel outside of the Solar System would be to make contact with anything that may be out there.

I don't think curiosity is a valid reason to spend those kind of $$.

It is a valid reason if moves us forward in national security, technology, etc. Unfortunately, that information is probably classified. We as citizens can only guess at the answer.

[Harold Mansfield]

I don't think curiosity is a valid reason to spend those kind of $$.

It is a valid reason if moves us forward in national security, technology, etc. Unfortunately, that information is probably classified. We as citizens can only guess at the answer.

Well, if we stumble upon or make contact with any advanced lifeforms, National Security will be the least of our worries.

[billbenson]

Well, if we stumble upon or make contact with any advanced lifeforms, National Security will be the least of our worries.

You mean like this one?

http://reason.com/assets/mc/_ATTIC/Image/jsullum/obama_smoking.png

[Harold Mansfield]

Now see, why'd you have to go and open up that can of worms and bring politics into it?

[billbenson]

I just thought it might help you out in your political blog.. :)

[Business Attorney]

I just Imax movie Hubble and it's clear that robots can't do everything humans can do - at least not yet. Without the Space Shuttle missions to service the Hubble telescope, it is clear that we would have only gotten a small fraction of the information produced by the telescope. Over the the last two decades, the Hubble telescope has given scientists an unprecedented look at the universe, answering many questions in the process and raising other questions. Very little of that would have happened if real life humans had not risked their lives to fly missions to fix the telescope.

I agree that the exploration of deep space will need to be done by unmanned probes. Voyager 1 and Voyager 2, launched in 1977, continue to collect scientific data even today. Obviously, a 33 year one way flight (or a 66 year round trip flight) would be well beyond what we could expect of a human crew. However, I don't know enough about what a scientific expedition to Mars, for example, might add to our knowledge to rule that out.

On the other hand, I also agree that mere curiosity is not justification to spend billions of dollars. We need to have some concrete reasons why sending humans is needed.

[Spider]

...On the other hand, I also agree that mere curiosity is not justification to spend billions of dollars. We need to have some concrete reasons why sending humans is needed.Wow! There's a statement for consideration.

We would still be living in caves if "mere curiosity" had not driven man to investigate his surroundings and create a better future.

I think that if man was to now only do things for which he has "concrete reasons" for doing them, that will be the beginning of the end of human history. Thankfully, that will never happen, and mankind will continue to be inquisitive and will continue to investigate for no other reason than "mere curiosity."

[Harold Mansfield]

Wow! There's a statement for consideration.

We would still be living in caves if "mere curiosity" had not driven man to investigate his surroundings and create a better future.

I think that if man was to now only do things for which he has "concrete reasons" for doing them, that will be the beginning of the end of human history. Thankfully, that will never happen, and mankind will continue to be inquisitive and will continue to investigate for no other reason than "mere curiosity."
I have to agree with you on that one. Just think of the things that we take for granted that we wouldn't know anything about if someone hadn't:

*Looked at a Shrimp and wondered what it tasted like ( I mean talk about a risk!)
*Jumped in a boat to see if the earth ended or not
*Touched fire just to make sure that it was indeed hot
*Cut open a body to see what was in there and how to fix the stuff in it.

Even what we all do for a living, I mean you do some leg work and a little investigation but ultimately it comes down to an educated guess, "I wonder if anyone will go for this and pay me for it?"

Our inquisitiveness and willingness to take a risk is how we got where we are today...we wouldn't be here without it.

[Business Attorney]

Maybe "concrete reason" wasn't a good choice of words but I stand by the concept. I think spending billions on the Hubble telescope was well worth it, but the reason was to learn more about the universe in a way that we could not do from Earth. Sending an unmanned probe to Mars to find out more about the red planet is also an idea I support.

Spending billions to send men to Mars without a clear reason for why that is better than sending an unmanned probe makes no sense to me.

Exploring on one's own is certainly justified by "mere curiosity." I agree that is how many things are discovered. However, I believe that spending billions of tax dollars should be based on some explainable benefit, not necessarily in dollars and cents but at least in some understandable sense.